Unii 
Si 


LIBRARY 

THE  UNIVERSITY 
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SANTA  BARBARA 


PRESENTED  BY 

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^jiUUK- 


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\WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 


PAST  AND  PRESENT  , 


A  STUDY  OF  THE   ENGLISH   LANGUAGE 


RICHARD  GRANT  WHITE 

REVISED  AND   CORRECTED 


BOSTON   AND   NEW   YORK 
HOUGHTON  MIFFLIN  COMPANY 


Copyright,  1899, 
By  HOUGHTON,  MIFFLIN  &  CO. 

All  rights  reserved. 


PUBLISHERS'  NOTE 

The  present  edition  of  TTbrcZs  and  their  Uses  is  a 
careful  reprint  of  tlie  book  as  finally  revised  by  the 
author.  The  demand  for  the  book,  both  by  tlie  gen- 
eral reader  and  by  the  student  of  English,  had  been 
so  large  and  so  constant  that  the  electrotype  plates 
had  been  badly  worn.  Accordingly  new  plates  have 
been  made  and  the  work  is  thus  reissued  to  give 
pleasure  and  profit  to  another  generation  of  readers. 

Boston,  Avdumn,  1899. 


AFTERTHOUGHTS   AND   FOREWORDS 
TO  THE  PRESENT  EDITION 

In  preparing  a  new  edition  of  this  book,  I  have 
sought  help  and  taken  hints  from  every  criticism  of 
it  that  I  have  seen ;  and  I  heard  of  none  that  I  did 
not  try  to  find  if  it  was  not  at  hand.  Whoever  at- 
tempts to  correct  the  faults  of  others  in  any  respect 
may  expect  severe  treatment  at  the  hands  of  the  very 
men  whom  he  would  serve ;  and  if  his  efforts  are 
directed  to  their  use  of  language,  he  may  reasonably 
look  forward  to  walking,  sitting,  and  sleeping  upon 
pen  points  for  a  while.  Wherefore  I  have  been  very 
pleasantly  surprised  that  of  the  much  that  has  been 
written  about  this  book,  so  little,  comparatively,  was 
dispai'aging.  In  only  one  quarter  have  I  found  reason 
to  complain  of  unfairness,  or  even  of  a  captious  spirit, 
while  the  general  tone  of  my  critics,  public  and  pri- 
vate, has  been  that  of  thankfulness  for  a  real  service. 
But  I  have  ti-ied  not  to  allow  myself  to  be  led  by  the 
favorable  judgment  of  my  critics  into  the  belief  that  I 
could  disregard  the  strictures  of  my  censors. 

In  many  passages  of  the  book  slight  changes  have 
been  made  ;  upon  matters  of  fact  and  of  opinion  a  few 
important  modifications  will  be  found  ;  one  new  chap- 
ter has  been  added.  The  sum  of  these  alterations  and 
corrections  will,  I  hope,  be  regarded  as  such  an  im- 
provement of  the  book  as  will  make  it  more  worthy 


iv  AFTERTHOUGHTS  AND  FOREWORDS 

of  the  attention  which  it  has  received.  The  most  of 
these  changes  would  have  been  made  of  my  own  mo- 
tion ;  but  for  some  of  them  my  readers  are  indebted 
to  the  suggestions  of  others. 

To  the  strictures  of  my  censors  I  have  not  replied, 
either  in  general  or  in  detail,  preferring  to  regard 
them  rather  as  instructors  than  even  as  enemies  by 
whom  fas  est  doceri.  As  to  whether  my  book  has  any 
value,  let  time  determine.  If  what  I  have  written 
cannot  bear  criticism,  it  is  worthless  and  ought  to  die. 
It  will  soon  disappear  into  the  limbo  of  things  for- 
gotten ;  and  the  less  that  is  said  about  it  the  better. 
Any  disparagement  of  the  "  scholarship  "  of  the  book 
gives  me  little  concern.  It  is  altogether  from  the  j^ur- 
pose.  Whatever  value  I  hoped  these  desultory  studies 
would  have  depends  in  the  least  that  is  possible  upon 
the  learning,  real  or  supposed,  of  the  author.  If  I 
have  any  reputation  of  that  sort,  it  is  not  of  my  seek- 
ing. Nor  do  I  claim  the  consideration  due  to  a  philo- 
logist. For  a  real  philologist  is  a  man  who,  horsed 
upon  Grimm's  law,  chases  the  evasive  syllable  over 
umlauts  and  ablauts  into  the  faintly  echoing  recesses 
of  the  Himalayas ;  and  I  confess  that  I  am  no  such 
linguistic  Nimrod.  I  have  joined  a  little  in  that  hunt ; 
but  like  the  Frenchman  who,  after  one  day  of  "  le 
sport  "  upon  the  soil  of  perfide  Albion,  being  sum- 
moned next  morning  for  another  run,  cried,  "  Vot,  do 
they  make  him  two  times?"  and  turned  his  aching 
bones  to  rest,  I  soon  retired,  and  left  the  field  to  bolder 
spirits  and  harder  riders.  This  is  said  now  because, 
having  been  said  before,  I  have  been  judged  as  if  I 
had  made  the  pretensions  which  were  then  and  which 
are  now  again  disclaimed.  I  therefore  repeat  from 
the  preface  of  the  previous  edition  that  "  the  points 


AFTERTHOUGHTS  AND  FOREWORDS  v 

from  which  I  have  regarded  words  are  in  general 
rather  those  of  taste  and  reason  than  of  history ;  and 
my  discussions  are  philological  only  as  all  study  of 
words  must  be  philological.  The  few  suggestions 
which  I  have  made  in  etymology  I  put  forth  with  no 
affectation  of  timidity,  but  with  little  concern  as  to 
their  fate."  It  is  upon  this  ground,  humbler  or 
higher,  that  in  good  faith  I  take  my  stand,  and  it  is 
only  this  that  I  profess  to  be  able  to  maintain. 

Besides  the  topics  of  taste  and  reason  in  the  use  of 
language,  there  are  two  to  which  I  have  ventured  to  di- 
rect attention.  Upon  one  of  these  my  position  (as  to 
which  I  have  no  vague  notion,  but  a  settled  convic- 
tion) is  that  in  the  development  of  language,  and  in 
particular  of  the  English  language,  reason  always  wins 
against  formal  grammar  or  illogical  usage,  and  that 
the  "  authority  "  of  eminent  writers,  conforming  to, 
or  forming,  the  usage  of  their  day,  while  it  does  ab- 
solve from  the  charge  of  solecism  those  who  follow 
such  example,  does  not  completely  justify  or  establish 
a  use  of  words  inconsistent  with  reason,  or  out  of  the 
direction  of  the  normal  growth  of  language.  In  other 
words,  I  believe,  assert,  and  endeavor  to  maintain 
that  in  language,  as  in  morals,  there  is  a  higher  law 
than  mere  usage,  which,  in  morals  as  in  language, 
makes  that  acceptable,  tolerable,  and  even  proper  in 
one  age  which  becomes  intolerable  and  improper  in 
another ;  that  this  law  is  the  law  of  reason,  toward  a 
conformity  to  which  usage  itself  is  always  struggling, 
and,  although  constantly  hindered  and  often  diverted, 
winning  its  way  little  by  little,  not  reaching,  yet  ever 
Hearing  an  ever-receding  goal.  To  assault  any  posi- 
tion of  mine  which  is  not  itself  taken  upon  the  ground 
of  usage,  by  bringing  up  the  "  authority,"  that  is,  the 


vi  AFTERTHOUGHTS  AND  FOREWORDS 

mere  example,  of  eminent  writers,  is  at  once  to  beg 
the  question  at  issue.  It  may  be  said,  and  is  said, 
that  in  language  usage  is  both  in  fact  and  of  right  the 
final  law  and  the  ground  of  law.  But  with  any  one 
who  takes  that  for  granted  I  cannot  argue.  We  do 
not  approach  each  other  near  enough  for  collision. 
We  are  as  widely  separated  as  two  theological  dispu- 
tants would  be,  one  of  whom  was  a  Protestant,  and  the 
other  a  Papist  who  set  up  as  an  axiom  the  divine 
establishment  and  perpetual  infallibility  of  the  Rom- 
ish Church.  He  assumes  and  starts  from  the  very 
point  that  I  dispute. 

That  language  has  in  all  respects  a  normal  growth, 
and  that  passing  deviations  from  that  normality  are 
not  to  be  defended  and  accepted  without  question  on 
the  ground  that  mere  eminent  usage  justifies  such 
irregularities,  I  do  verily  believe.  And  upon  this 
point  of  so-called  irregularity,  it  seems  to  me  that  the 
remarks  made  by  Helfenstein  in  the  introduction  to 
his  examination  of  the  anomalous  verbs,  are  of  even 
wider  application : 

"  Under  this  head  we  range  all  those  verbs  which 
in  their  inflexional  forms  show  certain  peculiarities  so 
as  to  require  separate  treatment  as  a  class  of  their 
own.  We  avoid  the  term  irregular,  for  it  is  high  time 
that  this  designation,  which  cannot  but  convey  erro- 
neous notions,  should  disappear  from  the  terminology 
of  grammarians.  There  is  nothing  irregular  in  these 
verbs,  and  nothing  irregular  in  language  generally. 
Every  phenomenon  is  founded  upon  a  law ;  it  is  not 
the  product  of  haphazard  or  of  an  arbitrary  will. 
Where  the  law  has  not  yet  been  discovered,  it  remains 
the  noblest  task  of  linguists  to  strive  after  its  discov- 
ery and  elucidation.     What  as  yet  evades  explanation 


AFTERTHOUGHTS  AND  FOREWORDS  vu 

may  be  left  standing  over  as  a  fact  which  is  sure  to 
find  some  day  sufficient  illustration  from  other  corol- 
lary facts  grouped  around.  But  we  must  do  away 
once  and  for  all  with  all  notions  of  irregularity,  and 
therefore  drop  the  term  which  keeps  such  notions 
alive."  —  (Comparative  Grammar  of  the  Teutonic 
Languages,  p.  499.) 

I  cannot  believe  that  the  arbitrary  and  capricious 
usage  of  a  clique  or  a  mere  generation  of  writers  is 
such  a  "  phenomenon "  as  Helfenstein  regards  as 
"  founded  upon  a  law,"  when  he  declares  that  there  is 
nothing  irregular  in  language  generally. 

And  as  to  the  weight  of  authority  which  is  claimed 
for  eminent  writers,  I  cannot  see  why  the  endowment 
of  creative  genius  should,  or  that  it  does,  insure  to  its 
possessor  a  greater  certainty  of  correctness  in  the  use 
of  language  than  may  go  with  the  possession  of  in- 
ferior powers.  To  admit  that  would  oblige  us  to  accept 
Chaucer  as  a  higher  authority  than  Gower,  Spenser  as 
higher  than  Sidney,  Lyly  than  Ascham,  ShakesjDeare 
than  Jonson,  Pope  than  Addison,  Scott  than  Hallam, 
Byron  than  Southey,  Carlyle  than  Landor  or  Macau- 
lay,  Dickens  than  Helps. 

Upon  the  second  of  the  topics  to  which  I  have  re- 
ferred, that  English  is  to  all  intents  and  purposes  a 
grammarless  tongue,  and  therefore  has  a  superiority 
over  all  others,  I  shall  let  what  I  have  said  stand 
without  further  argument,  only  calling  to  my  support 
this  passage  from  Sidney's  "  Apologie  for  Poetrie," 
which  when  I  wrote  before  I  had  utterly  forgotten. 
Speaking  of  English,  he  says  :  — 

"  I  know  some  will  say  it  is  a  mingled  language. 
And  why  not  so  much  the  better,  taking  the  best  of 
both  the  other?     Another  will   say  that   it  wanteth 


viii  AFTERTHOUGHTS  AND  FOREWORDS 

Grammer.  Nay  truly  it  hath  that  praise  that  it  want- 
eth  not  [i.  e.,  does  not  need]  Grammer :  for  Gram- 
mer it  might  have,  but  it  needes  it  not ;  being  so  easie 
of  it  selfe,  and  so  voyd  of  those  cumbersome  differ- 
ences of  Cases,  Genders,  Moodes,  and  Tenses,  which  I 
think  was  a  peece  of  the  Tower  of  Babilon's  curse, 
that  a  man  should  be  put  to  schoole  to  learne  his 
mother  tongue.  But  for  the  uttering  sweetly  and 
properly  the  conceits  of  the  minde,  which  is  the  end 
of  speech,  that  hath  it  equally  with  any  other  tongue  in 
the  world  :  and  is  particulerly  happy  in  compositions 
of  two  or  three  words  together  neere  the  Greeke,  far 
beyond  the  Latine :  which  is  one  of  the  greatest 
beauties  can  be  in  a  language." 

What  Sidney  saw,  and  thus  with  sweet  dogmatism 
set  forth,  I  have  but  endeavored  to  illustrate  and  to 
establish. 

Why  I  have  been  called  upon  to  write  this  book  is 
still  not  easy  for  rae  to  understand.  For  it  is  the  re- 
sult of  questions  submitted  to  me  from  correspondents 
in  all  parts  of  the  country  upon  the  subject  of  which 
it  treats,  although  I  can  hardly  pretend  to  have  made 
a  special  study  of  language  —  no  other,  in  fact,  than 
was  part  and  parcel  of  studies  in  English  literature 
generally,  and  particularly  that  of  the  Elizabethan 
period.  But  as  these  questions  were  speered  at  me,  I 
thought  it  would  be  pleasant  and  profitable  to  answer 
them  in  the  articles  which  have  been  gathered  into 
this  volume.  Let  me  say  to  my  correspondents  and 
readers  that  if  any  of  them  hope  to  acquire  a  good 
style,  or  to  "  learn  to  write,"  by  reading  such  books 
as  this,  or  even  by  the  study  of  grammar  and  rhetoric, 
as  I  have  reason  to  fear  that  some  of  them  do,  they 
will   be   grievously   disapj)ointed.      That   acquisition 


AFTERTHOUGHTS  AND   FOREWORDS  uc 

comes  only  through  native  ability  and  general  culture. 
No  man  ever  learned  to  win  the  ear  of  the  public  by 
studies  of  this  nature.  Those  who  write  what  is  read 
with  pleasure  and  profit  do  not  get  their  power  or 
learn  their  craft  from  dictionaries,  grammars,  or  books 
on  rhetoric.  The  study  of  language  must  be  pursued 
for  its  own  sake.  It  has  only  a  place,  although  a  high 
one,  in  that  general  culture  which  gives  mental  disci- 
pline and  makes  the  accomplished  man.  He  who  can- 
not write  with  clearness  and  force  without  troubling:  his 
soul  about  pronouns  and  prepositions,  syntax  and  de- 
finitions, may  better  change  his  pen  for  a  hoe  and  his 
inkstand  for  a  watering-pot,  and  give  his  days  and  nights 
to  market-gardening ;  an  occupation  equally  honorable 
with  literature,  and,  I  can  assure  him,  far  more  profit- 
able, no  less  to  the  world  at  large  than  to  the  individ- 
ual.    With  which  counsel  I  bid  my  readers  farewell. 


TO  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

My  dear  Sir: 

When  your  forefather  met  mine,  as  he  probably  did,  some 
two  hundred  and  thirty  or  forty  years  ago,  in  the  newly  laid  out 
street  of  Cambridge  (and  there  is  reason  for  believing  that  the 
meeting  was  likely  to  be  about  where  Gore  Hall  now  stands), 
yours  might  have  been  somewhat  more  grimly  courteous  than 
he  doubtless  was,  had  he  known  that  he  saw  the  man  one  of 
whose  children  in  the  eighth  generation  was  to  pay  one  of  his, 
at  the  same  remove,  even  this  small  tribute  of  mere  words;  and 
mine  might  have  lost  some  of  his  reputation  for  inflexibility  had 
he  known  that  he  was  keeping  on  his  steeple-crown  before  him 
without  whom  there  would  be  no  "Legend  of  Brittany,"  no 
"Sir  Launfal,"  no  "  Commemoration  Ode,"  no  "Cathedral,"  no 
"Biglow  Papers,"  —  without  whom  our  idea  of  the  New  Eng- 
land these  men  helped  to  found  would  lack,  in  these  latter  days, 
some  of  the  strength  and  the  beauty  which  make  it  worthy  of 
our  respect,  our  admiration,  and  our  love,  —  and  without  whom 
the  great  school  that  was  soon  set  up  where  they  were  standing, 
to  be  the  first  and  ever  the  brightest  light  of  learning  in  the  land, 
would  miss  one  of  its  most  shining  ornaments. 

We  may  be  sure  that  both  these  honored  men  spoke  English 
in  the  strong  and  simple  manner  of  their  time,  of  which  you 
have  well  said  that  it  was  "  a  diction  which  we  should  be  glad  to 
buy  back  from  desuetude  at  almost  any  cost,"  and  which  you 
have  done  so  much  to  illustrate,  to  perpetuate,  and  to  enrich. 
I  have  as  little  faith  as  I  believe  you  have  in  the  worth  of  a 
school-bred  language.  Strong,  clear,  healthy,  living  speech 
springs,  like  most  strong,  living  things,  from  the  soil,  and  grows 
according  to  the  law  of  life  within  its  seed.  But  pruning  and 
training  may  do  something  for  a  nursery-bred  weakling,  and 
even  for  that  which  springs  up  unbidden,  and  grows  with  native 
vigor  into  sturdy  shapeliness.    It  is  because  you  have  shown  this 


xu  TO  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

in  a  manner  which  makes  all  men  of  New  England  stock  your 
dehtors,  and  proud  of  their  indebtedness,  that  at  the  beginning 
of  a  book  which  seeks  to  do  in  the  weakness  of  precept  what 
you  have  done  by  the  strength  of  example,  I  acknowledge,  in  so 
far  as  I  may  presume  to  do  so,  what  is  owing  to  you  by  all  your 
countrymen,  and  also  record  the  high  respect  and  warm  regard 
writh  which  I  am,  and  hope  ever  to  be, 

Faithfully  your  friend, 

Richard  Gkant  White- 
New  YOBK,  August  3,  1870. 


PREFACE 

The  following  pages  contain  the  substance  of  the 
articles  which  appeared  in  "The  Galaxy"  in  the  years 
1867, 1868,  and  1869,  under  the  title  now  borne  by 
this  volume.  Some  changes  in  the  arrangement  of 
the  subjects  of  those  articles,  some  excisions,  and  a 
few  additions,  have  been  made  ;  but  after  reading, 
with  a  willingness  to  learn,  nearly  all  the  criticisms 
with  which  I  was  favored,  I  have  found  reason  for 
abandoning  or  modifying  very  few  of  my  previously 
expressed  opinions. 

The  purpose  of  the  book  is  the  consideration  of  the 
right  use  and  the  abuse  of  words  and  idioms,  with  an 
occasional  examination  of  their  origin  and  their  his- 
tory. It  is  occupied  almost  exclusively  with  the  cor- 
rectness and  fitness  of  verbal  expression,  and  any 
excursion  into  higher  walks  of  philology  is  transient 
and  incidental. 

Soon  after  taking  up  this  subject,  I  heard  a  story 
of  a  professor  at  Oxford,  who,  being  about  to  address 
a  miscellaneous  audience  at  that  seat  of  learning,  illus- 
trated some  of  his  positions  by  quotations  in  the  origi- 
nal from  Arabic  writers.  A  friend  venturing  to  hint 
that  this  might  be  caviare  to  his  audience,  he  replied, 
"  Oh,  everybody  knows  a  little  Arabic."  Now,  I  have 
discovered  that  everybody  does  not  know  a  little  Ara- 
bic ;  and  more,  that  there  are  men  all  around  me,  of 
intelligence  and  character,  who,  although  they  cannot 


xiv  PREFACE 

be  called  illiterate,  —  as  peasants  are  illiterate,  — 
know  so  very  little  of  the  right  use  of  English,  that, 
without  venturing  beyond  the  limits  of  my  own  yet 
imperfect  knowledge  of  my  mother  tongue,  I  might 
undertake  to  give  the  instruction  that  I  find  many  of 
them  not  only  need,  but  desire. 

The  need  is  particularly  great  in  this  country ;  of 
which  fact  I  have  not  only  set  forth  the  reasons,  but 
have  endeavored  to  explain  them  with  such  detail  as 
would  enable  my  readers  to  see  them  for  themselves, 
and  take  them  to  heart,  instead  of  merely  ac(!epting  or 
rejecting  my  assertion.  Since  I  first  gave  these  rea- 
sons in  "  The  Galaxy,"  they  have  been  incidentally, 
but  earnestly  and  impressively,  presented  by  Professor 
Whitney  in  his  book  on  Language  and  the  Study 
of  Language.  Summing  up  his  judgment  on  this 
point,  that  eminent  philologist  says,  "  The  low-toned 
party  newspaper  is  too  much  the  type  of  the  prevail- 
ing literary  influence  by  which  the  style  of  speech  of 
our  rising  generation  is  moulding.  A  tendency  to 
slang,  to  colloquial  inelegances,  and  even  vulgarities, 
is  the  besetting  sin  against  which  we,  as  Americans, 
have  especially  to  guard  and  to  struggle." 

What  Professor  Whitney  thus  succinctly  declares, 
I  have  endeavored  to  set  forth  at  large  and  to  illus- 
trate. Usage  in  the  end  makes  language  ;  determin- 
ing not  only  the  meaning  of  words,  but  their  sugges- 
tiveness,  and  also  their  influence.  For  the. influence 
of  man  upon  language  is  reciprocated  by  the  influence 
of  language  upon  man  ;  and  the  mental  tone  of  a  com- 
munity may  be  vitiated  by  a  yielding  to  the  use  of 
loose,  coarse,  low,  and  frivolous  phraseology.  Into 
this  people  fall  by  the  mere  thoughtless  imitation  of 
slovenly  exemplars.     A  case  in  point  —  trifling  and 


PREFACE  XV 

amusing,  but  not,  therefore,  less  suggestive  —  recently- 
attracted  my  attention.  Professor  Whitney  mentions, 
as  one  of  his  many  illustrations  of  the  historical  char- 
acter of  word-making,  tliat  we  put  on  a  "  pair  of  rnb- 
bers,'^  because,  when  caoutchouc  was  first  brought  to 
us,  we  could  find  no  better  use  for  it  than  the  rubbing 
out  of  pencil-marks.  But  overshoes  of  this  material 
are  not  universally  called  "  rubbers."  In  Philadel- 
phia, with  a  reference  to  the  nature  of  the  substance 
of  which  they  are  made,  they  are  called  "  gums."  A 
Pliiladelphia  gentleman  and  his  wife  going  to  make  a 
visit  at  a  house  in  New  York,  where  they  were  very 
much  at  home,  he  entered  the  parlor  alone  ;  and  to 
the  question,  "Why,  where  is  Emily?"  answered, 
"  Oh,  Emily  is  outside  cleaning  her  gums  upon  the 
mat ; "  whereupon  there  was  a  momentary  look  of  as- 
tonishment, and  then  a  peal  of  laughter.  Now,  there 
is  no  need  whatever  of  the  use  of  either  of  the  poor 
words  rubbers  or  gums  in  this  sense.  The  proper 
word  is  simply  overshoes,  which  expresses  all  that 
there  is  occasion  to  tell,  except  to  a  manufacturer  or 
a  salesman.  There  is  neither  necessity  nor  propriety 
in  our  going  into  the  question  of  the  fabric  of  what 
we  wear  for  the  protection  of  our  feet,  and  of  saying 
that  a  lady  is  either  rubbing  her  rubbers  or  cleaning 
her  gums  on  the  mat ;  no  more  than  there  is  in  our 
saying  that  a  gentleman  is  brushing  his  wool  (mean- 
ing his  coat),  or  a  lady  drying  her  eyes  with  her  linen 
(meaning  her  handkerchief).  Language  is  generally 
formed  by  indirect  and  unconscious  effort ;  but  when 
a  language  is  subjected  to  the  constant  action  of  such 
degrading  influences  as  those  which  threaten  ours,  it 
may  be  well  to  introduce  into  its  development  a  little 
consciousness.     The   difference    between    saying.   He 


xvi  PREFACE 

donated  the  balance  of  the  lumber,  and  He  gave  the 
rest  of  the  timber,  is  perhaps  trifling ;  but  man's  lan- 
guage, like  man  himself,  grows  by  a  gradual  accretion 
of  trifles,  and  the  sum  of  these,  in  our  case,  is  on  the 
one  hand  good  English,  and  on  the  other  bad.  There- 
fore they  are  not  unworthy  of  any  man's  serious  atten- 
tion. 

Language  is  rarely  corrupted,  and  is  often  enriched, 
by  the  simple,  unpretending,  ignorant  man,  who  takes 
no  thought  of  his  parts  of  speech.  It  is  from  the 
man  who  knows  just  enough  to  be  anxious  to  square 
his  sentences  by  the  line  and  plummet  of  grammar 
and  dictionary  that  his  mother  tongue  suffers  most 
grievous  injury.  It  is  his  influence  chiefly  which  is 
resisted  in  this.  book.  I  have  little  hope,  I  must  con- 
fess, of  undoing  any  of  the  harm  that  he  has  done, 
or  of  plucking  up  any  monstrosity  which,  planted  by 
him,  has  struck  root  into  the  popular  speech  ;  particu- 
larly if  it  seems  fine,  and  is  not  quite  understood  by 
those  who  use  it. 

Tran^jiive  and  i)f^dicate  —  worthy  pair  —  will  be 
used,  I  fear,  the  one  to  mean  happen,  and  the  other 
found ;  things  will  continue  to  he  being  done^  and  the 
gentlemanly  barkeeper  of  the  period  will  call  his  grog- 
shop a  samjyle-room,  notwithstanding  all  that  I  have 
said,  and  all  that  abler  men  and  better  scholars  than 
I  am  may  say,  to  the  contrary.  But,  although  I  do 
not  expect  to  purge  away  corruption,  I  do  hope  to 
arrest  it  in  some  measure  by  giving  hints  that  help 
toward  wholesomeness. 

This  book  may  possibly  correct  some  of  the  pre- 
vailing evils  against  which  it  is  directed  ;  but  I  shall 
be  satisfied  if  it  awakens  an  attention  to  its  subject 
that  will  prevent  evil  in  the  future.     Scholars  and 


PREFACE  xvii 

philologists  need  not  be  told  that  it  is  not  addressed 
to  them  ;  but  neither  is  it  written  for  the  unintel- 
ligent and  entirely  uninstructed.  It  is  intended  to  be 
of  some  service  to  intelligent,  thoughtful,  educated 
persons,  who  are  interested  in  the  study  of  the  Eng- 
lish language,  and  in  the  protection  of  it  against 
pedants  on  the  one  side  and  coarse  libertines  in  lan- 
guage on  the  other. 

On  the  etymology  of  words  I  have  said  little, 
because  little  was  needed.  The  points  from  which  I 
have  regarded  words  are  in  general  rather  those  of 
taste  and  reason  than  of  history  ;  and  my  discussions 
are  philological  only  as  all  study  of  words  must  be 
philological.  The  few  suggestions  which  I  have  made 
in  etymology  I  put  forth  with  no  affectation  of  timid- 
ity, but  with  little  concern  as  to  their  fate.  Ety- 
mology, which,  as  it  is  now  practised,  is  a  product 
of  the  last  thirty  years,  fulfils  toward  language  the 
function  which  the  antiquarian  and  the  genealogist 
discharge  in  the  making  of  the  world's  history.  The 
etymologist  of  the  present  day  follows,  as  he  should 
follow,  his  word  up  step  by  step  through  the  written 
records  of  past  years,  until  he  finds  its  origin  in  the 
fixed  form  of  a  parent  language.  The  disappearance 
of  every  letter,  the  modification  of  every  sound,  the 
introduction  of  every  new  letter,  must  be  accounted 
for  in  accordance  with  the  analogy  of  the  language  at 
the  period  when  the  change,  real  or  supposed,  took 
place.  Thus  etymology  has  at  last  been  placed  upon 
its  only  safe  bases,  —  research  and  comparison,  —  and 
the  origin  of  most  words  in  modern  languages  is  as 
surely  determinable  as  that  of  a  member  of  any  family 
which  has  a  recorded  history. 

I  have  only  to  add  here  that  in  my  remarks  on  what 


xviii  PREFACE 

I  have  unavoidably  called,  by  way  of  distinction,  Brit- 
ish  English  and  "  American  "  English,  and  in  my  criti- 
cism of  the  style  of  some  eminent  British  authors,  no 
insinuation  of  a  superiority  in  the  use  of  their  mother 
tongue  by  men  of  English  race  in  "  America "  is 
intended,  no  right  to  set  up  an  independent  standard 
is  implied.  Of  the  latter,  indeed,  there  is  no  fear. 
When  that  new  "  American  "  thing,  so  eagerly  sought, 
and  hitherto  so  vainly,  does  appear,  if  it  ever  do  ap- 
pear, it  will  not  be  a  language  or  even  a  literature. 


This  book  was  prepared  for  the  press  in  the  autumn  of  1869. 
An  unavoidable  and  unexpected  delay  in  its  appearance  has  en- 
abled me  to  add  a  few  examples  in  illustration  of  my  views, 
which  I  have  met  with  since  that  time;  but  it  has  received  no 
other  additions. 

R.  G.  W. 

New  York,  July  8, 1870. 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  I 
Introduction 3 

CHAPTER  II 
Newspaper  English.    Big  Words  fob  Small  Thoughts.      18 

CHAPTER  III 
British  English  and  "American"  English 33 

CHAPTER  IV 
Style 52 

CHAPTER  V 
Misused  Words 68 

CHAPTER  VI 
Some  Briticisms 166 

CHAPTER  VII 
Words  that  are  not  Words 182 

CHAPTER  Vni 
Formation  of  Pronouns  —  Some  —  Adjectives  in  En  — 

Either  and  Neither  —  Shall  and  Will 220 

CHAPTER  IX 
Grammar,  English  and  Latin 254 

CHAPTER  X 
The  Grammabless  Tongue 274 

CHAPTER  XI 
Is  Being  Done 311 


XX  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  XII 
A  Desultory  Denunciation  of  English  Dictionaries     .    339 

CHAPTER  XIII 

"Jus   ET   NORJLA.   LOQUENDl" 366 

Conclusion 397 

APPENDIX 

I.  How  THE  Exception  proves  the  Rule 407 

II.  Controversy 415 

Indes 429 


WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 


"  They  be  not  wise,  therefore  that  say,  what  care  I  for  man's  wordes  and  utter- 
ance, if  hys  matter  and  reasons  be  good  ?  Such  men,  say  so,  not  so  much  of  ignor- 
ance, as  eyther  of  some  singular  pride  in  themselves,  or  some  speciall  malice  of 
other,  or  for  some  private  and  parciall  matter,  either  in  Religion  or  other  kynde  of 
learning.  For  good  and  choice  meates,  be  no  more  requisite  for  helthy  bodyes,  than 
proper  and  apt  wordes  be  for  good  matters,  and  also  playne  and  sensible  utterance 
for  the  best  and  deepest  reasons ;  in  which  two  poyntes  standeth  perfect  eloquence, 
one  of  the  fay  rest  and  rarest  giftes  that  God  doth  geve  to  man." 

Ascham's  Scholbmastee,  fol.  46,  ed.  1571. 

'  "  Seeing  that  truth  consisteth  in  the  right  ordering  of  names  in  our  affirmations, 
a  man  that  seeketh  precise  truth  hath  need  to  remember  what  every  name  he  useth 
stands  for,  and  to  place  it  accordingly,  or  else  he  will  find  himselfe  entangled  in 
words  as  a  bird  in  lime-twiggs.     The  more  he  struggles  the  more  belimed." 

EoBBEs's  Leviathan,  I.  4. 

"  F.     Must  we  always  be  seeking  after  the  meaning  of  words  ? 

"^.  Of  important  words  we  must,  if  we  wish  to  avoid  important  error.  The 
meaning  of  these  words  especially  is  of  the  greatest  consequence  to  mankind,  and 
seems  to  have  been  strangely  neglected  by  those  who  have  made  most  use  of  them." 
TooKB,  DrvEESioNS  OP  PuHLEY,  Part  II.,  ch.  i. 

"  Mankind  in  general  are  so  little  in  the  habit  of  looking  steadily  at  their  own 
meaning  or  of  weighing  the  words  by  which  they  express  it,  that  the  writer  who  is 
careful  to  do  both  will  sometimes  mislead  his  readers  through  the  very  excellence 
which  qualifies  him  to  be  their  instructor ;  and  this  vrith  no  other  fault  on  his  part 
than  the  modest  mistake  on  his  part  of  supposing  in  those  to  whom  he  addresses  him- 
self an  intellect  as  watchful  as  his  own." 

CoLEBiDQE,  The  Friend,  II.,  2d  Landing  Place. 


WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 


CHAPTER  I 

INTRODUCTION 


One  of  the  last  judgments  pronounced  in  philology 
is,  that  words  are  merely  arbitrary  sounds  for  the 
expression  and  communication  of  ideas ;  that,  for 
instance,  a  man  calls  the  source  of  light  and  heat  the 
sun,  because  his  mother  taught  him  so  to  call  it,  and 
that  is  the  name  by  which  it  is  known  to  the  people 
around  him,  and  that  if  he  liad  been  taught  in  his 
childhood,  and  by  example  afterwards,  to  call  it  the 
moon,  he  would  have  done  so  without  question.  But 
this  truth  was  declared  more  than  two  hundred  years 
ago  by  Oliver  Cromwell  in  his  reply  to  the  committee 
that  waited  upon  him  from  Parliament  to  ask  him  to 
take  the  title  of  king.  In  the  course  of  his  refusal  to 
yield  to  their  request,  he  said,  — 

"  Words  have  not  their  import  from  the  natural  power  of  par- 
ticular combinations  of  characters,  or  from  the  real  efficacy  of 
certain  sounds,  but  from  the  consent  of  those  that  use  them,  and 
arbitrarily  annex  certain  ideas  to  them,  which  might  have  been 
signified  with  equal  propriety  by  any  other." 

Thus  mother  wit  forestalled  philological  deduction  ; 
but  the  reasoning  would  be  weak  that  found  in  the 
fact  that  language  is  formed,  on  the  whole,  by  consent 


4  WORDS  AND   THEIR  USES 

and  custom,  an  argument  in  favor  of  indifference  as 
to  the  right  or  wrong  of  usage.  For,  although  he  was 
so  earnestly  entreated  thereto,  and  although  it  would 
have  obviated  some  difficiilty  in  the  administration  of 
the  government,  Cromwell,  notwithstanding  his  opin- 
ion as  to  the  arbitrary  meaning  of  words,  refused  to 
be  called  a  king,  because  king  meant  something  that 
he  was  not,  and  had  associations  which  he  wished  not 
to  bring  up.  And  although  to  the  individual  words 
are  arbitrary  to  the  race  or  the  nation,  they  are 
growths,  and  are  themselves  the  fruit  and  the  sign  of 
the  growth  of  the  race  or  the  nation  itself.  So  words 
have,  like  men,  a  history,  and  alliances,  and  rights  of 
birth,  and  inherent  powers  which  endure  as  long  as 
they  live,  and  which  they  can  transmit,  although  some- 
what modified,  to  their  rightful  successors. 

But  although  most  words  are  more  immutable,  as 
well  as  more  enduring,  than  men  are,  some  of  them 
within  the  memory  of  one  generation  vary  both  in 
their  forms  and  in  the  uses  which  they  serve,  doing 
so  according  to  the  needs  and  even  the  neglect  of  the 
users.  And  thus  it  is  that  living  languages  are  always 
changing.  Spoken  words  acquire,  by  use  and  from 
the  varying  circumstances  of  those  who  use  them, 
other  and  wider  significations  than  those  which  they 
had  originally ;  inflections  are  dropped,  and  construc- 
tion is  modified,  its  tendency  being  generally  towards 
simplicity.  Changes  in  inflection  and  construction 
are  found  not  to  be  casual  or  capricious,  but  processes 
according  to  laws  of  development ;  which,  however,  as 
in  the  case  of  all  laws,  physical  or  moral,  are  deduced 
from  the  processes  themselves.  The  apparent  opera- 
tion of  these  laws  is  recognized  so  submissively  by 
some  philologists   that  Dr.  Latham  has  propounded 


INTRODUCTION  5 

the  dogma  that  in  language  whatever  is,  is  right ;  to 
which  he  adds  another,  as  a  corollary  to  the  former, 
that  whatever  was,  was  wrong.  But  even  if  we  admit 
that  in  language  whatever  is  —  that  is,  whatever  usage 
obtains  generally  among  the  people  who  speak  a  lan- 
guage as  their  mother  tongue  —  is  right,  that  is,  fulfils 
the  true  function  of  language,  which  is  to  serve  as 
a  communication  between  man  and  man,  it  certainly 
therefore  follows  that,  whatever  was,  was  also  right ; 
because  it  did,  at  one  time,  obtain  generally,  and  did 
fulfil  the  function  of  language. 

The  truth  is,  that,  although  usage  may  be  compul- 
sory in  its  behests,  and  thus  establish  a  government 
de  facto,,  which  men  have  found  that  they  must  recog- 
nize whether  they  will  or  no,  in  language,  as  in  all 
other  human  affairs,  that  which  is  may  be  wrong. 
There  is  some  other  law  in  language  than  the  mere 
arbitrary  will  of  the  users.  Language  is  made  for 
man,  and  not  man  for  language  ;  but  yet  no  man,  no 
number  of  men,  however  great,  can  of  purpose  change 
the  meaning  of  one  monosyllable.  For,  unless  the 
meaning  of  words  is  fixed  during  a  generation,  lan- 
guage will  fail  to  impart  ideas,  and  even  to  communi- 
cate facts.  Unless  it  is  traceable  throujrh  the  writings 
of  many  generations  in  a  connected  course  of  normal 
development,  language  becomes  a  mere  temporary  and 
arbitrary  mode  of  intercourse  ;  it  fails  to  be  an  expo- 
nent of  a  people's  intellectual  growth ;  and  the  speech 
of  our  immediate  forefathers  dies  upon  their  lips,  and 
is  forgotten.  Of  such  misfortune  there  is,  however, 
not  the  remotest  probability. 

The  recognition  of  the  changes  which  the  English 
language  has  been  undergoing  from  the  time  when 
cur  Anglo-Saxon,  or  rather  our  English,  forefathers 


6  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

took  possession  of  the  southern  part  of  Britain,  is  no 
discovery  of  modern  philology.  The  changes,  and  the 
inconvenience  which  follows  them,  were  noticed  four 
hundred  years  ago  by  William  Caxtou,  our  first 
printer  —  a  "  simple  person,"  as  he  describes  himself, 
but  an  observant,  a  thoughtful,  and  a  very  intelligent 
man,  and  one  to  whom  English  literature  is  much 
indebted.  He  was  not  only  a  printer,  but  a  writer; 
and  as  a  part  of  his  literary  labor  he  translated  into 
English  a  French  version  of  the  ^Eneid,  and  published 
it  in  the  year  1490.  In  Caxton's  preface  to  that  book 
is  a  passage  which  is  interesting  in  itself,  and  also 
germane  to  our  subject.  I  will  give  the  passage  en- 
tire, and  in  our  modern  orthography  :  — 

"  And  when  I  had  advised  me  in  this  said  book,  I  deliberated 
and  concluded  to  translate  it  into  English,  and  forthwith  took  a 
pen  and  ink  and  wrote  a  leaf  or  twain,  which  I  oversaw  again  to 
correct  it;  and  when  I  saw  the  fair  and  strange  terms  therein,  I 
doubted  that  it  should  not  please  some  gentlemen  which  late 
blamed  me,  saying,  that  in  my  translations  I  had  over-curious 
terms  which  could  not  be  understonden  of  common  people,  and 
desired  me  to  use  old  and  homely  terms  in  my  translations;  and 
fain  would  I  satisfy  every  man;  and  so  to  do,  took  an  old  book 
and  read  therein;  and  certainly  the  English  was  so  rude  and 
broad  that  I  could  not  well  understand  it.  And  also  my  Lord 
Abbot  of  Westminster  did  shew  to  me  of  late  certain  evidences 
written  in  old  P2nglish,  for  to  reduce  it  into  our  English  now 
used,  and  certainly  it  was  written  in  such  wise  that  it  was  more 
like  Dutch  than  English.  I  could  not  reduce  ne  bring  it  to  be 
understonden.  And  certainly  our  language  now  used  varyeth 
far  from  what  was  used  and  spoken  wlien  I  was  born.  For  we 
Englishmen  ben  born  under  the  domination  of  the  Moon,  which 
is  never  steadfast,  but  ever  wavering,  waxynge  one  season  and 
waneth  and  decreasetli  another  season,  and  that  common  Eng- 
lish that  is  spoken  in  one  Shire  varieth  from  another.  Inso- 
nmch  that  in  my  days  it  happened  that  certain  merchants  were 
in  a  ship  in  Tamis  [Thames]  for  to  have  sailed  over  the  sea  into 


INTRODUCTION  7 

Zealand,  and  for  lack  of  wind  they  tarried  at  Forlaiid,  and  went 
to  land  for  to  refresh  them.  And  one  of  them  named  Sheffield, 
a  mercer,  came  into  an  honse  and  axed  for  meat,  and  specially 
Le  axed  for  eggs.  And  tlie  good  wife  answered  that  she  conld 
speak  no  French;  and  the  merchant  was  angry;  for  he  also 
could  speak  no  French,  but  would  have  had  the  eggs,  and  she 
understood  him  not.  And  then  at  last  another  said  that  he  would 
have  eyren ;  then  the  good  wife  said  that  slie  understood  liiin 
well.  Lo,  what  should  a  man  in  these  days  write  ?  eggs  or 
eyren  ?  Certainly  it  is  hard  to  please  every  man,  because  of 
diversity  and  change  of  language.  For  in  these  days  every  man 
that  is  in  any  reputation  in  this  country  will  utter  his  communi- 
cation and  matters  in  such  manner  and  terms  that  few  men  shall 
understand  them ;  and  some  honest  and  great  clerks  have  been 
with  me  and  desired  me  to  write  the  most  curious  terms  that  I 
could  find.  And  thus  between  plain,  rude,  and  curious,  I  stand 
abashed." 

My  chief  purpose  in  giving  this  passage  in  our  reg- 
ulated spelling  is,  that  the  reader  may  notice  how 
entirely  it  is  written  in  the  English  of  to-day.  Except 
axed,  which  we  have  heard  used  ourselves,  and  eyren, 
which  Caxton  himself  notices  as  obsolete,  hen,  ne,  and 
understonden  are  the  only  words  in  it  which  have 
not  just  the  form  and  the  meaning  that  we  now  give 
to  them  ;  and  but  for  these  five  words  and  a  little 
quaintness  of  style,  the  passage  in  its  construction  and 
its  idiom  might  have  been  written  yesterday.  And 
yet  the  writer  was  born  in  the  reign  of  Henry  IV., 
and  died  a  hundi-ed  years  before  Shakespeare  wrote 
his  first  play.  He  says,  too,  in  another  part  of  his 
preface,  that  he  wrote  in  the  idiom  and  with  the  vo- 
cabulary in  use  among  educated  people  of  his  day,  in 
"  Englishe  not  over  rude,"  on  the  one  hand,  "  ne 
curyous,"  that  is,  affected  and  elaborately  fine,  on  the 
other.  If  the  changes  in  language  which  took  place 
during  his  life  were  as  great  as  he   seems   to   have 


8  WORDS   AND  THEIR  USES 

thought  them,  if  they  were  as  great  as  those  with 
which  in  the  present  day  we  seem  to  be  threatened, 
certainly  the  period  intervening  between  the  time 
which  saw  him  a  middle-aged  man  and  now  —  four 
hundred  years  —  seems  by  contrast  to  have  been  one 
of  almost  absolute  linguistic  stagnation.  This,  how- 
ever, is  mere  seeming.  The  period  of  which  Caxton 
speaks  was  one  in  which  the  language  was  crystal- 
lizing into  its  present  form,  and  becoming  the  English 
known  to  literature  ;  and  changes  then  were  rapid  and 
noticeable.  The  changes  of  our  day  are  mostly  the 
result  of  the  very  superficial  instruction  of  a  large 
body  of  people,  who  read  much  and  without  discrim- 
ination, whose  reading  is  chiefly  confined  to  news- 
papers hastily  written  by  men  also  very  insufficiently 
educated,  and  who  are  careless  of  accuracy  in  their 
ordinary  speaking  and  writing,  and  ambitious  of  liter- 
ary excellence  when  they  make  any  extraordinary 
effort.  The  tendency  of  this  intellectual  condition  of 
a  great  and  active  race  is  to  the  degradation  of  lan- 
guage, the  utter  abolition  of  simple,  clear,  and  manly 
speech.  Against  this  tendency  it  behooves  all  men 
who  have  means  and  opportunity  to  strive,  almost  as 
if  it  were  a  question  of  morals.  For  there  is  a  kind 
of  dishonesty  in  the  careless  and  incorrect  use  of 
language. 

Purity,  however,  is  not  a  quality  which  can  be  ac- 
curately predicated  of  language.  What  the  phrase 
so  often  heard,  "  pure  English,"  really  means,  it  woidd, 
probably,  puzzle  those  who  use  it  to  explain.  For  our 
modern  tongues  are  like  many  buildings  that  stand 
upon  sites  long  swept  over  by  the  ever-advancing, 
though  backward  and  forward  shifting  tide  of  civiliza- 
tion.    They  are  built  out  of  the  ruins  of  the  work  of 


INTRODUCTION  9 

previous  generations,  to  which  we  and  our  immediate 
predecessors  have  added  something  of  our  own.  This 
process  has  been  going  on  since  the  disappearance  of 
the  first  generation  of  speaking  men ;  and  it  will  never 
cease.  But  there  will  be  a  change  in  its  mode  and 
rate.  The  change  has  begun  already.  The  invention 
of  printing,  the  instruction  of  the  mass  of  the  peo- 
ple, and  the  ease  of  popular  intercommunication, 
will  surely  prevent  any  such  corruption  and  detrition 
of  language  as  that  which  has  resulted  in  the  mod- 
ei'n  English,  German,  French,  Spanish,  and  Italian 
tongues.  Phonetic  degradation  will  play  a  less 
important  part  than  it  has  heretofore  played  in  the 
history  of  language.  Changes  in  the  forms,  and  varia- 
tion in  the  meanings  of  words  will  be  slow,  and  if  not 
deliberate,  at  least  half  conscious  ;  and  the  corrup- 
tions that  we  have  to  guard  against  are  chiefly  those 
consequent  upon  pretentious  ignorance  and  aggressive 
vulgarity. 

It  may  be  reasonably  doubted  whether  there  ever 
was  a  pure  language  two  generations  old ;  that  is, 
a  language  homogeneous,  of  but  one  element.  All 
tongues  known  to  philology  show,  if  not  the  mingling 
in  considerable  and  nearly  determinable  proportions 
of  two  or  three  linguistic  elements,  at  least  the  adop- 
tion and  adaptation  of  numerous  foreign  words.  Eng^ 
lish  has  for  many  centuries  been  far  from  being  a 
simple  language.  Chaucer's  "  well  of  English  unde- 
filed  "  is  very  pleasant  and  wholesome  drinking ;  but 
pronouns,  prepositions,  conjunctions,  and  "  auxiliary  " 
verbs  aside,  it  is  a  mixture  in  which  Normanized, 
Gallicized  Latin  is  mingled  in  large  proportion  with  a 
base  of  degraded  Anglo-Saxon.  And  yet  the  result 
of  this  hybridity  and  degradation  is  the  tongue  in 


10  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

which  Shakespeare  wrote,  and  the  translators  of  the 
Bible,  and  Milton,  and  Bunyan,  and  Burke,  and  Gold- 
smith, and  Irving,  and  Hawthorne ;  making  in  a  lan- 
guage without  a  superior  a  literature  without  an 
equal. 

But  the  presence  in  our  language  of  two  elements, 
both  of  which  are  essential  to  its  present  fulness  and 
force,  no  less  than  to  its  fineness  and  flexibility,  does 
not  make  it  sure  that  these  are  of  equal  or  of  nearly 
equal  importance.  Valuable  as  the  Latin  adjuncts  to 
our  language  are,  in  the  appreciation  of  their  value 
it  should  never  be  forgotten  that  they  are  adjuncts. 
The  frame,  the  sinews,  the  nerves,  the  heart's  blood, 
in  brief,  the  body  and  soul  of  our  language,  is  Eng- 
lish ;  Latin  and  Greek  furnish  only  its  limbs  and  out- 
ward flourishes.  If  what  has  come  to  us  through  the 
Normans,  and  since  their  time  from  France  and  Italy 
and  the  Latin  lexicon,  were  turned  out  of  our  voca- 
bulary, we  could  live,  and  love,  and  work,  and  talk, 
and  sing,  and  have  a  folk-lore  and  a  higher  literature. 
But  take  out  the  former,  the  movement  of  our  lives 
would  be  clogged,  and  the  language  would  fall  to 
pieces  for  lack  of  framework  and  foundation,  and  we 
could  do  none  of  those  things.  We  might  teach  in 
the  lecture-room,  and  formulate  the  results  of  our 
work  in  the  laboratory,  but  we  should  be  almost  mute 
at  home,  and  our  language  and  our  literature  would 
be  no  more  ours  than  it  would  be  France's,  or  Spain's, 
or  Italy's. 

To  the  Latin  we  owe,  as  the  most  cursory  student 
of  our  language  must  have  observed,  a  great  propor- 
tion of  the  vocabulary  of  philosophy,  of  art,  of  science, 
and  of  morals ;  and  by  means  of  words  derived  from 
the  Latin  we  exDress,  as  it  is  assumed,  shades  of 


INTRODUCTION  11 

thouglit  and  of  feeling  finer  than  those  of  which  our 
simple  mother  tongue  is  capable.  But  it  may  at  least 
be  doubted  whether  we  do  not  turn  too  quickly  to  tlie 
Latin  lexicon  when  we  wish  a  name  for  a  new  thought 
or  a  new  thing,  and  whether  out  of  the  simples  of  our 
ancient  English,  or  Anglo-Saxon,  so-called,  we  might 
not  have  formed  a  language  coj^ious  enough  for  all  the 
needs  of  the  highest  civilization,  and  subtle  enough 
for  all  the  requisitions  of  philosophy.  For  instance, 
what  we  call,  in  Latinish  phrase,  remorse  of  con- 
science, our  forefathers  called  againbite  of  inwit ;  and 
in  using  the  former  we  express  exactly  the  same  ideas 
as  are  expressed  by  the  latter.  As  the  corresponding 
compounds  and  the  corresponding  elements  have  the 
same  meaning,  what  more  do  we  gain  by  putting  to- 
gether re  and  morse,  con  and  science,  than  by  doing 
the  same  with  again  and  bite,  in  and  wit  f  The  Eng- 
lish words  now  sound  uncouth,  and  j^rovoke  a  smile, 
but  they  do  so  only  because  we  are  accustomed  to  the 
Latin  derivatives.  No  advantage  seems  likely  to  be 
pleaded  for  the  use  of  the  latter  other  than  that  they 
produce  a  single  impression  on  the  mind  of  the  Eng- 
lish-speaking man,  causing  him  to  accept  remorse  and 
conscience  as  simple  words,  expressing  simple  things, 
without  the  suggestion  of  a  biting  again  and  an  inner 
witting.  But  it  may  first  be  doubted  whether  this 
thoughtless,  unanalytic  acceptance  of  a  word  is  with- 
out some  drawback  of  dissipating  and  enfeebling  dis- 
advantage ;  and  next,  and  chiefly,  it  may  be  safely 
asserted  that  the  English  compounds  would  produce, 
if  in  common  use,  as  single  and  as  strong  an  impres- 
sion as  the  Latin  do.  Who  that  does  not  stop  to 
think  and  take  to  pieces  receives  other  than  a  single 
impression  from  such  words  as  insight  (bereaved  twin 


12  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

of  inwit),  gospel^  falseJiood,  worship^  Jiomely^  hreah- 
fast,  tmthful,  hoyhood,  household,  hrimstone,  twi- 
light, acorn,  chestnut,  instead,  homestead,  and  the 
like,  of  which  our  common  current  English  would  fur- 
nish numberless  examples  ? 

In  no  way  is  our  language  more  wronged  than  by 
the  weak  readiness  with  which  many  of  those  who, 
having  neither  a  hearty  love  nor  a  ready  mastery  of 
it,  or  lacking  both,  fly  to  the  Latin  tongue  or  to  the 
Greek  for  help  in  the  naming  of  a  new  thought  or 
thing,  or  the  partial  concealment  of  an  old  one,  call- 
ing, for  instance,  nakedness  nudity,  and  a  bathing-tub 
a  lavatory.  By  so  doing  they  help  to  deface  the  char- 
acteristic traits  of  our  mother  tongue,  and  to  mar  and 
stunt  its  kindly  growth. 

No  one  denies  —  certainly  I  do  not  deny  —  the  value 
of  the  Latin  element  of  our  modern  English  in  the 
expression  of  abstract  ideas  and  general  notions.  It 
also  gives  amplitude,  and  ease,  and  grace  to  a  lan- 
guage which  without  it  might  be  admirable  only  for 
compact  and  rugged  strength.  All  which  being 
granted,  it  still  remains  to  be  shown  that  there  is  not 
in  simple  English  —  that  is,  Anglo-Saxon  without  in- 
flections —  the  power  of  developing  a  vocabulary  com- 
petent to  all  the  requirements  of  philosophy,  of  science, 
of  art,  no  less  than  of  society  and  of  sentiment.  I 
believe  that  pure  English  has,  in  this  respect  at  least, 
the  full  capacity  of  the  German  language.  Neverthe- 
less, one  of  the  advantages  of  English  over  German, 
in  form  and  euphony,  is  in  this  very  introduction  of 
Anglicized  Latin  and  Greek  words  for  the  expression 
of  abstract  ideas,  which  relieves  us  of  such  quintuple 
compounds,  for  instance,  as  sjn'achwisscnscha/'tsein- 
Jieit.     With  the  expression  of  abstract  ideas  and  sci* 


INTRODUCTION  13 

entific  facts,  however,  the  Latinization  of  our  language 
should  stop,  or  it  will  lose  its  home  character,  and  kin 
traits,  and  become  weak,  flabby,  and  inflated,  and 
thus  ridiculous. 

One  of  the  changes  to  which  language  is  subject 
during  the  healthy  intellectual  condition  of  a  peo])le, 
and  in  its  progress  from  rudeness  to  refinement,  is  the 
casting  off  of  rude,  clumsy,  and  insufficiently  worked- 
out  forms  of  speech,  sometimes  mistakenly  honored 
under  the  name  of  idioms.  Siieech,  the  product  of 
reason,  tends  more  and  more  to  conform  itself  to 
reason ;  and  when  grammar,  which  is  the  formulation 
of  usage,  is  opposed  to  reason,  there  arises,  sooner  or 
later,  a  conflict  between  logic,  or  the  law  of  reason, 
and  grammar,  the  law  of  precedent,  in  which  the 
former  is  always  victorious.  And  this  has  been  nota- 
bly the  case  in  the  history  of  the  English  language. 
Usage,  therefore,  is  not,  as  it  is  often  claimed  to  be, 
the  absolute  law  of  language ;  and  it  never  has  been 
so  with  any  people  —  could  not  be,  or  we  should  have 
an  example  of  a  language  which  had  not  changed  from 
what  it  was  in  its  first  stage,  if  indeed  under  such  a 
law  there  coidd  be  a  first  stage  in  language.  Horace, 
indeed,  in  a  passage  often  quoted,  seems  to  have  ac- 
cepted usage  as  the  supreme  authority  in  speech  :  — 

' '  si  volet  usus, 
Quern  penes  arbitrium  est,  et  jus,  et  norma  loquendi." 

But  if  this  dictum  were  unconditional,  and  common 
usage  were  the  absolute  and  rightful  arbiter  in  all 
questions  of  language,  there  would  be  no  hope  of  ira 
provement  in  the  speech  of  an  ignorant  and  degraded 
society,  no  rightful  protest  against  its  mean  and  mon- 
strous colloquial  phrases,  which,  indeed,  would  then 
be  neither  mean  nor  monstrous ;  the  fact  that  they 


14  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

were  in  use  being  their  full  justification.  The  truth 
is,  however,  that  the  authority  of  general  usage,  or 
even  of  the  usage  of  great  writers,  is  not  absolute  in 
language.  There  is  a  misuse  of  words  which  can  be 
justified  by  no  authority,  however  great,  by  no  usage, 
however  general. 

And,  as  usage  does  not  justify  that  which  is  essen- 
tially unreasonable,  so  in  the  fact  that  a  word  or 
phrase  is  an  innovation,  a  neologism,  there  is  no- 
thing whatever  to  deter  a  bold,  clear-headed  thinker 
from  its  use.  Otherwise  language  would  not  grow. 
New  words,  when  they  are  needed,  and  are  rightly 
formed,  and  so  clearly  discriminated  that  they  have 
a  meaning  peculiarly  their  own,  enrich  a  language ; 
while  the  use  of  one  word  to  mean  many  things,  more 
or  less  unlike,  is  the  sign  of  poverty  in  speech,  and 
the  source  of  ambiguity,  the  mother  of  confusion. 
For  these  reasons  the  objection  on  the  part  of  a  writer 
upon  language  to  a  word  or  a  phrase  should  not  be 
that  it  is  new,  but  that  it  is  inconsistent  with  reason, 
incongruous  in  itself,  or  opposed  to  the  genius  of  the 
tongue  into  which  it  has  been  introduced.  Something 
must  and  surely  will  be  sacrificed  in  language  to  con- 
venience ;  but  too  much  may  be  sacrificed  to  brevity. 
A  periphrasis  which  is  clear  and  forcible  is  not  to  be 
abandoned  for  a  shorter  phrase,  or  even  a  single  word, 
which  is  ambiguous,  barbarous,  grotesque,  or  illogical. 
Unless  much  is  at  stake,  it  is  always  better  to  go  clean 
and  dry-shod  a  little  way  about  than  to  soil  our  feet 
by  taking  a  short  cut. 

For  two  centuries  and  a  half,  since  the  time  when 
King  Lear  was  written  and  our  revised  translation  of 
the  Bible  made,  the  English  language  has  suffered 
little  change,  either  by  loss  or  gain.     Excepting  that 


INTRODUCTION  15 

which  was  slang,  or  cant,  or  loose  colloquialism  in  his 
day,  there  is  little  in  Shakespeare's  plays  which  is  not 
heard  now,  more  or  less,  from  the  lips  of  English- 
speaking  men  ;  and  to  his  vocabulary  they  have  added 
little  except  words  which  are  names  for  new  things. 
The  language  has  not  sensibly  improved,  nor  has  it 
deteriorated.  In  the  latter  part  of  the  last  century 
it  was  in  some  peril.  We  ran  the  risk,  then,  of  the 
introduction  of  a  scholarly  diction  and  a  formal  style 
into  our  literature,  and  of  a  separation  of  our  collo- 
quial speech,  the  language  of  common  folk  and  common 
needs,  from  that  of  literary  people  and  grand  occasions. 
That  danger  we  happily  escaped,  and  we  still  speak 
and  write  a  common,  if  not  a  homogeneous  language, 
in  which  there  is  no  word  which  is  excluded  by  its 
commonness  or  its  meanness  from  the  highest  strain 
of  poetry. 

Criticism,  however,  is  now  much  needed  to  keep  our 
language  from  deterioration,  to  defend  it  against  the 
assaults  of  presuming  half-knowledge,  always  bolder 
than  wisdom,  always  more  perniciously  intrusive  than 
conscious  ignorance.  Language  must  always  be  made 
by  the  mass  of  those  who  use  it :  but  when  that  mass  is 
misled  by  a  little  learning,  —  a  dangerous  thing  only 
as  edge  tools  are  dangerous  to  those  who  will  handle 
them  without  understanding  their  use,  —  and  under- 
takes to  make  language  according  to  knowledge  rather 
than  by  instinct,  confusion  and  disaster  can  be  warded 
off  only  by  criticism.  Criticism  is  the  child  and  hand- 
maid of  reflection.  It  works  by  censure  ;  and  censure 
implies  a  standard.  As  to  words  and  the  use  of  words, 
the  standard  is  either  reason,  whose  laws  are  absolute, 
or  analogy,  whose  milder  sway  hinders  anomalous, 
barbarous,  and    solecistic  changes,   and   helps   those 


16  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

which  are  in  harmony  with  the  genius  of  a  language. 
Criticism,  setting  at  nought  the  assumption  of  any 
absolute  authority  in  language,  may  check  bad  usage 
and  reform  degraded  custom.  It  may  not  only  resist  the 
introduction  of  that  which  is  debasing  or  enfeebling, 
but  it  may  thrust  out  vicious  words  and  phrases  which 
through  carelessness  or  perverted  taste  may  have  ob- 
tained a  footing.  It  is  only  by  such  criticism  that  our 
language  can  now  be  restrained  from  license  and  pre- 
served from  corruption.  Criticism  cannot  at  once, 
with  absolute  and  omnipotent  voice,  banish  the  bad  and 
establish  or  introduce  the  good ;  but  by  watchfulness 
and  reason  it  may  gradually  form  such  a  taste  in  those 
who  are,  if  not  the  framers,  at  least  the  arbiters,  of 
linguistic  law,  that  thus,  by  indirection  finding  direc- 
tion out,  it  may  insui-e  the  effectual  condemnation  of 
that  which  itself  could  not  exclude. 

Until  comparatively  late  years  language  was  formed 
by  the  intuitive  sense  of  those  who  spoke  it ;  but  now, 
among  highly  civilized  peoples,  the  element  of  con- 
sciousness is  entering  into  its  production.  If  con- 
sciousness must  be  present,  it  should  be,  at  least  in 
the  last  resort,  the  consciousness  of  trained  and  culti- 
vated minds  ;  and  such  consciousness  is  critical,  indeed 
is  criticism.  And  those  who  feel  the  need  of  sup- 
port in  giving  themselves  to  the  study  of  verbal  criti- 
cism may  find  it  in  the  comfortable  words  of  Scaliger 
the  younger,  who  says,  "  The  sifting  of  these  subtleties, 
although  it  is  of  no  use  to  machines  for  grinding  corn, 
frees  the  mind  from  the  rust  of  ignorance,  and  sharpens 
it  for  other   matters."  ^     And  it  may  reassure  us  to 

1  Harum  indagatio  subtilitatum,  etsi  non  est  utilis  ad  maclii- 
nas  farinarias  conflciendas,  exuit  animum  tamen  inscitiae  rubi- 
gine,  acuit-que  ad  alia. 


INTRODUCTION  17 

remember  that,  in  the  crisis  of  the  great  struggle  be- 
tween Caisar  and  Pompey,  Cicero,  being  then  in  the 
zenith  of  his  power,  turned  aside,  in  a  letter  to  At- 
ticus  upon  weighty  affairs  of  state,  to  discuss  a  point 
of  grammar  with  that  eminent  critic. 


CHAPTER  n 

NEWSPAPER  ENGLISH.      BIG  WORDS   FOR   SMALL 
THOUGHTS 

Simple  and  unpretending  ignorance  is  always 
respectable,  and  sometimes  charming  ;  but  there  is 
little  that  more  deserves  contempt  than  the  pretence 
of  ignorance  to  knowledge.  The  curse  and  the  peril 
of  language  in  this  day,  and  particularly  in  this  coun- 
try, is,  that  it  is  at  the  mercy  of  men  who,  instead  of 
being  content  to  use  it  well  according  to  their  honest 
ignorance,  use  it  ill  according  to  their  affected  know- 
ledge ;  who,  being  vulgar,  would  seem  elegant ;  who, 
being  empty,  would  seem  full ;  who  make  up  in  pre- 
tence what  they  lack  in  reality ;  and  whose  little 
thoughts,  let  off  in  enormous  phrases,  sound  like  fire- 
crackers in  an  empty  barrel. 

"  How  I  detest  the  vain  parade 

Of  big-mouthed  words  of  large  pretence ! 
And  shall  they  thus  thy  soul  degrade, 

0  tongue  so  dear  to  common  sense  ! 
Shouldst  thou  accept  the  i^ompous  laws 

By  which  our  blustering  tyros  prate, 
Soon  Shakespeare's  songs  and  Bunyan's  sa'ws 

Some  tumid  trickster  must  translate. 

"  Our  language,  like  our  daily  life. 
Accords  the  homely  and  sublime, 
And  jars  with  phrases  that  are  rife 

With  pedantry  of  every  clime. 
For  eloquence  it  clangs  like  arms. 
For  love  it  touches  tender  chords, 


NEWSPAPER   ENGLISH  19 

But  he  to  whom  the  workl's  heart  warms 

Must  speak  in  wholesome,  home-bred  words." 

To  the  reader  who  is  familiar  with  Beranger's 
"  Derniers  Chansons  "  these  lines  will  bring  to  mind 
two  stanzas  in  the  jioet's  "  Tambonr  Major,"  in  which 
he  compares  pretentions  phrases  to  a  big,  bedizened 
drum-major,  and  simple  language  to  the  little  gray- 
coated  Napoleon  at  Austerlitz  —  a  comparison  which 
has  been  brought  to  my  mind  very  frequently  during 
the  writing  of  this  book. 

It  will  be  well  for  us  to  examine  some  examples  of 
this  vice  of  language  in  its  various  kinds ;  and  for 
them  we  must  go  to  the  newsjsaper  press,  which  reflects 
so  truly  the  surface  of  modern  life,  although  its  sur- 
face only. 

There  is,  first,  the  style  which  has  rightly  come  to 
be  called  newspaper  English,  and  in  which  we  are 
told,  for  instance,  of  an  attack  upon  a  fortified  posi- 
tion on  the  Potomac,  that  "  the  thousand-toned  artil- 
lery duel  progresses  magnificently  at  this  hour,  the 
howling  shell  bursting  in  wild  profusion  in  camp  and 
battery,  and  among  the  trembling  pines."  I  quote 
this  from  the  columns  of  a  first-rate  New  York  news- 
paper, because  the  real  thing  is  so  much  more  char- 
acteristic than  any  imitation  could  be,  and  is  quite  as 
ridiculous.  This  style  has  been  in  use  so  long,  and 
has,  day  after  day,  been  impressed  upon  the  minds  of 
so  many  persons  to  whom  news^iapers  are  authority, 
as  to  language  no  less  than  as  to  facts,  that  it  is  actu- 
ally coming  into  vogue  in  daily  life  with  some  of  our 
people.  Not  long  ago  my  attention  was  attracted  by 
a  building  which  I  had  not  noticed  before,  and,  step- 
ping up  to  a  policeman  who  stood  hard  by,  I  asked 
him  what  it  was.     He  promptly  replied  (I  wrote  down 


20  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

his  answer  within  the  minute),  "  That  is  an  institoo- 
tion  inaugurated  under  the  auspiceb  of  the  Sisters  of 
Mercy,  for  the  reformation  of  them  young  females 
what  has  deviated  from  the  paths  of  rectitood."  It 
was  in  fact  an  asyhim  for  women  of  the  town  ;  but  my 
informant  would  surely  have  regarded  such  a  descrip- 
tion of  it  as  inelegant,  and  perhaps  as  indelicate. 
True,  there  was  a  glaring  incongruity  between  the 
pcmpousness  of  his  phraseology  and  his  use  of  those 
simple  and  common  parts  of  speech,  the  pronouns ; 
but  I  confess  that,  in  his  dispensation  of  language, 
-  them  "  and  "  what "  were  the  only  crumbs  from 
which  I  received  any  comfort.  But  could  I  find  fault 
with  my  civil  and  obliging  informant,  when  I  knew 
that  every  day  he  might  read  in  the  leading  articles 
of  our  best  newspapers  such  sentences,  for  instance, 
as  the  following  ?  — 

"  There  is,  without  doubt,  some  subtle  essence  permeating  the 
elementary  constitution  of  crime  which  so  operates  that  men  and 
women  become  its  involuntary  followers  by  sheer  force  of  attrac- 
tion, as  it  were." 

I  am  sure,  at  least,  that  the  policeman  knew  better 
what  he  meant  when  he  spoke  than  the  journalist  did 
what  he  meant  when  he  wrote.  Policeman  and  jour- 
nalist both  wished  not  merely  to  tell  what  they  knew 
and  thought  in  the  simplest,  clearest  way,  they  wished 
to  say  something  elegant,  and  to  use  fine  language ; 
and  both  made  themselves  ridiculous.  Neither  this 
fault  nor  this  complaint  is  new ;  but  the  censure  seems 
not  to  have  diminished  the  fault,  either  in  frequency 
or  in  degree.  Our  every-day  writing  is  infested  with 
this  silly  bombast,  this  stilted  nonsense.  One  jour- 
nalist, reflecting  upon  the  increase  of  violence,  and 
wishing  to  say  that  ruffians  should  not  be  allowed  to 


NEWSPAPER  ENGLISH  21 

go  armed,  writes,  "  We  cannot,  however,  allow  the  op- 
portunity to  pass  without  expressing  our  surprise  that 
the  law  should  allow  such  abandoned  and  desperate 
characters  to  remain  in  possession  of  lethal  weapons." 
Lethal  means  deadly,  neither  more  nor  less  ;  but  it 
would  be  very  tame  and  unsatisfying  to  use  an  ex- 
pression so  common  and  so  easil}'  understood.  An- 
other journalist,  in  the  course  of  an  article  upon  a 
murder,  says  of  the  murderer  that  "  a  policeman  went 
to  his  residence,  and  there  secured  the  clothes  that  he 
wore  when  he  committed  the  murderous  deed ;  "  and 
that,  being  found  in  a  tub  of  water,  "  they  were  so 
smeared  hy  blood  as  to  incarnadine  the  water  of  the 
tub  in  which  they  w^ere  deposited."  To  say  that  "the 
policeman  went  to  the  house  or  room  of  the  murderer, 
and  there  found  the  clothes  he  wore  when  he  did  the 
murder,  which  were  so  bloody  that  they  reddened  the 
water  into  which  they  had  been  thrown,"  would  have 
been  far  too  homely. 

But  not  only  are  our  journals  and  our  speeches  to 
Buncombe  infested  with  this  big-worded  style,  the  very 
preambles  to  our  acts  of  legislature,  and  the  official 
reports  upon  the  driest  and  most  matter-of-fact  sub- 
jects, are  bloated  with  it.  It  appears  in  the  full 
flower  of  absurdity  in  the  following  sentence,  which  I 
find  in  the  report  of  a  committee  of  the  legislature  of 
New  York  on  street  railways.  The  committee  wished 
to  say  that  the  public  looked  upon  all  plans  for  the 
running  of  fast  trains  at  a  height  of  fifteen  or  twenty 
feet  as  fraught  with  needless  danger ;  and  the  com- 
mittee man  who  wrote  for  them  made  them  say  it  in 
this  amazing  fashion  :  — 

"  It  is  not  to  be  denied  that  any  system  which  demands  the 
propulsion  of  cars  at  a  rapid  rate,  at  an  elevation  of  fifteen  or 


22  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

twenty  feet,  is  not  entirely  consistent,  in  public  estimation,  with 
the  greatest  attainable  immunity  from  the  dangers  of  transpor- 
tation." 

Such  a  use  of  words  as  this  indicates  only  the  lack 
as  well  of  mental  vigor  as  of  good  taste  and  of  educa- 
tion on  the  part  of  the  user.  "  Oh,"  said  a  charming, 
highly  cultivated,  and  thorough-bred  woman,  speaking, 
in  my  hearing,  of  one  of  her  own  sex  of  inferior  breed- 
ing and  position,  but  who  was  making  literary  preten- 
sions, and  with  some  success  so  far  as  notoriety  and 
money  were  concerned,  —  "  Oh,,  save  me  from  talking 
with  that  woman !  If  you  ask  her  to  come  and  see 
you,  she  never  says  she 's  sorry  she  can't  come,  but 
that  she  regrets  that  the  multiplicity  of  her  engage- 
ments precludes  her  from  accepting  your  polite  in- 
vitation." 

The  foregoing  instances  are  examples  merely  of  a 
pretentious  and  ridiculous  use  of  words  which  is  now 
very  common.  They  are  not  remarkable  for  incor- 
rectness. But  the  freedom  with  which  persons  who 
have  neither  the  knowledge  of  language  which  comes 
of  culture,  nor  that  which  springs  spontaneously  from 
an  inborn  perception  and  mastery,  are  allowed  to 
address  the  public  and  to  speak  for  it,  produces  a 
class  of  writers  who  fill,  as  it  is  unavoidable  that  they 
should  fill,  our  newspapers  and  public  documents  with 
words  which  are  ridiculous,  not  only  from  their  pre- 
tentiousness, but  from  their  preposterous  unfitness  for 
the  uses  to  which  they  are  put.  These  persons  not 
only  write  abominably  in  point  of  style,  but  they  do 
not  say  what  they  mean.  When,  for  instance,  a  mem- 
ber of  Congress  is  spoken  of  in  a  leading  journal  as  "  a 
sturdy  repviblican  of  progressive  integrity,"  no  very 
great  acquaintance  with  language  is  necessary  to  the 


NEWSPAPER  ENGLISH  23 

discovery  that  the  writer  is  ignorant  of  the  meaning 
either  oi  jyrogress  or  of  integrity.  When  in  the  same 
columns  another  man  is  described  as  being  "  endowed 
with  an  impassionable  nature,"  people  of  common  sense 
and  education  see  that  here  is  a  man  not  only  writing 
for  the  public,  but  actually  attempting  to  coin  words, 
who,  so  far  as  his  knowledge  of  language  goes,  needs 
the  instruction  to  be  had  in  a  good  common  school.  So, 
again,  when  another  journal  of  position,  discoursing 
upon  convent  discipline,  tells  us  that  a  young  woman 
is  not  fitted  for  "  the  stern  amenities  of  religious  life," 
and  we  see  it  laid  down  in  a  report  to  an  important 
public  body,  that,  under  certain  circumstance,  "  the 
criminality  of  an  act  is  heightened,  and  reflects  a  very 
turgid  morality  indeed,"  it  is,  according  to  our  know- 
ledge, whether  we  find  in  the  phrases  "  stern  ameni- 
ties "  and  "  turgid  morality "  occasion  for  study  or 
food  for  laughter. 

Writing  like  this  is  a  fruit  of  a  pitiful  desire  to 
seem  elegant  when  one  is  not  so,  which  troubles 
many  people,  and  which  manifests  itself  in  the  use  of 
words  as  well  as  in  the  wearing  of  clothes,  the  buying 
of  furniture,  and  the  giving  of  entertainments  ;  and 
which  in  language  takes  form  in  words  which  sound 
large,  and  seem  to  the  person  who  uses  them  to  give 
him  the  air  of  a  cultivated  man,  because  he  does  not 
know  exactly  what  they  mean.  Such  words  some- 
times become  a  fashion  among  such  people,  who  are 
numerous  enough  to  set  and  keep  up  a  fashion  ;  and 
they  go  on  using  them  to  each  other,  each  afraid  to 
admit  to  the  other  that  he  does  not  know  what  the 
new  word  means,  and  equally  afraid  to  avoid  its  use, 
as  a  British  snob  is  said  never  to  admit  that  he  is 
entirely  unacquainted  with  a  duke.     Our  newspapers 


24  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

and  reviews  are  haunted  now  by  two  words  of  this 
sort — normal  and  inaugurate.  In  the  "  North  Amer- 
ican Review  "  itself  (I  name  this  review  because  of  its 
very  high  literary  position  —  a  position  higher  now 
than  ever  before)  a  writer  is  permitted  to  say  that, 
"  This  idea  [that  of  a  ship  without  a  bowsprit]  was 
doubtless  a  copy  of  the  model  inaugurated  by  Mr. 
E.  K.  Collins,  founder  of  the  Collins  line  of  American 
Ocean  Steamships."  The  writer  meant  invented  or 
introduced ;  and  he  might  as  well  have  written  about 
the  President  of  the  United  States  being  invented  on 
the  4th  of  March,  as  of  inaugurating  the  model  of  a 
ship.  But  ere  long  we  shall  probably  have  the  mil- 
liners inaugurating  their  bonnets,  and  the  cooks  mak- 
ing for  us  normal  plum  puddings  and  pumpkin  pies. 
But  normal  and  inaugurate,  and  a  crowd  of  such  big 
words,  are  now  used  as  Bardolph  uses  accommodated^ 
which,  being  approved  by  Mr.  Justice  Shallow  as  a 
good  phrase,  he  replies,  "  By  this  day  I  know  not  the 
phrase  ;  but  1  will  maintain  the  word  with  my  sword 
to  be  a  soldier-like  word,  and  a  word  of  exceeding 
good  command.  Accommodated ;  that  is,  when  a 
man  is,  as  they  say  —  accommodated  ;  or,  when  a 
man  is  —  being  —  whereby  —  he  may  be  thought  to 
be  accommodated  ;  which  is  an  excellent  thing." 

There  is  no  telling  to  what  lengths  this  desire  to 
speak  fine  will  lead.  It  breaks  out  very  strongly 
with  some  people  in  the  use  of  have  and  were.  They 
have  taken  into  their  heads  a  hazy  notion  of  the 
superior  elegance  of  those  words  —  as  to  the  latter 
from  having  heard  it  used  by  persons  who  are  precise 
as  to  their  subjunctive  mood ;  how  as  to  the  former  I 
cannot  conjecture.  So,  some  of  them,  when  they  wish 
to  be  very  fine  indeed,  say,  "  I  were  going  to  Europe 


NEs'/SPAPER  ENGLISH  25 

last  fall,  but  were  prevented  by  the  multiplicity  of  my 
engagements,"  leaving  was  in  the  company  of  plain 
and  simple  folk.  I  was  witness  to  a  characteristic 
exhibition  of  this  kind  of  pretence.  With  two  or 
three  friends  I  called  on  business  at  the  house  of  a 
very  wealthy  man  in  the  Fifth  Avenue,  whom  I  had 
never  met  before,  and  who  has  since  gone  to  the  place 
where  "  all  good  Americans  go  when  they  die."  lie 
proposed  that  we  should  ride  with  him  to  the  place  to 
visit  which  was  the  object  of  our  gathering,  and  he 
stepped  out  to  give  some  orders.  As  the  carriage 
came  to  the  door  he  reentered  the  parlor,  and  ap- 
proaching our  group,  revolving  his  hands  within  each 
other,  as  if  troubled  by  a  consciousness,  partly  remi- 
niscence, that  they  needed  washing,  he  said  witli  a  little 
smirk,  "  Gentlemen,  the  carriage  have  arrived."  We 
stood  it,  as  sober  as  judges;  but  one  of  us  soon  made 
an  execrable  pun,  which  afforded  opportunity  for 
laughter,  in  which  our  host,  as  ignorant  of  a  play 
upon  words  as  of  the  use  of  them,  heartily  joined. 
Now,  that  man,  if  he  had  been  speaking  to  his  wife, 
would  have  called  out,  "  Sairy  Ann,  the  carriage  has 
come,"  and  have  rivalled  Thackeray  or  Hawthorne  in 
the  correctness  of  his  English. 

We  are  suffering  now,  and  shall  suffer  more  here- 
after, from  the  improper  use  of  words,  in  a  very  im- 
portant point,  to  wit,  the  drafting  of  our  laws.  When 
the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  was  framed,  the 
language  of  the  instrument  was  considered  with  great 
care.  Each  paragraph,  after  having  been  discussed 
in  committee  and  in  full  convention,  and  its  purport 
clearly  determined,  was  submitted  to  the  revision  of 
a  committee  on  style,  and  it  was  not  adopted  until  it 
had  received  the  sanction  of  that  committee.     Hence 


26  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

it  is  that  there  is  hardly  a  passage  in  the  whole  Con- 
stitution the  meaning  of  which  can  be  doubted ;  the 
disputes  about  the  Constitution  being,  ahnost  without 
exception,  not  as  to  what  it  provides,  but  as  to  the 
effects  of  its  provisions.  But  as  to  most  of  the  laws 
passed  nowadays,  both  in  the  state  and  national  legis- 
latures, it  would  puzzle  those  who  do  not  know  the 
purpose  of  their  framers  to  discover  it  from  their  lan- 
guage ;  and  when  the  present  generation  of  politicians 
has  passed  away,  these  laws,  if  they  last  until  that 
time,  will  bear  any  construction  that  any  court,  or 
any  majority  of  any  Congress,  chooses  to  put  upon 
them ;  which,  perhaps,  in  the  view  of  the  latter,  will 
be  an  advantage.  Some  of  the  laws  passed  in  the 
last  two  sessions  of  Congress  have  little  more  coher- 
ence or  consistency  than  some  of  Mother  Goose's 
rhymes.  But  passing  by  such  laws  as  touch  great 
questions  of  public  policy,  and  as  to  which,  therefore, 
it  might  be  unreasonable  to  expect  our  present  legis- 
lators to  express  themselves  with  clearness  and  pro- 
priety, take,  for  example,  the  following  section  of  a 
bill  brought  into  the  legislature  of  New  York  in 
regard  to  the  metropolitan  police  :  — 

"  Section  16.  The  Board  of  Metropolitan  Police  is  hereby- 
authorized,  in  their  discretion,  to  pay  out  of  the  Police  Life  In- 
surance Fund  an  amount,  not  exceeding  three  hundred  dollars, 
to  the  members  of  the  force  who  may  be  disabled  while  in  the 
discharge  of  their  duties.  In  cases  of  death  by  injuries  received 
while  discharging  their  duties,  the  annuities  shall  be  continued 
to  the  widow,  or  children,  or  both,  as  the  Board  may  deem  best. 
The  Board  of  Metropolitan  Police  is  hereby  constituted  Trustees 
of  the  Life  Insurance  Fund." 

Laying  no  stress  upon  such  English  as  "  the  board 
is  authorized  in  their  discretion,"  and  "  the  board  is 
constituted  trustees,''  let  us  try  to  find  out  what  it  is 


NEWSPAPER  ENGLISH  27 

that  the  beard  is  authorized  to  do.  It  is  "  to  pay  an 
amount  not  exceeding  three  hundred  dollars  to  the 
members  of  the  force  who  may  be  disabled  while  in 
the  discharge  of  their  duties."  That  is,  unmistakably, 
according  to  the  language  used,  to  pay  three  hundred 
dollars  to  all  the  members  of  the  force  who  may  be  so 
injured.  This  seems  rather  a  small  provision  for  the 
purpose  in  view ;  as  to  which  there  is  still  further  un- 
certainty. For  who  are  all  the  members  of  the  force, 
for  whom  this  provision  is  made  ?  All  who  are  in- 
jured during  the  existence  of  the  board  ?  So  the  law 
says,  and  there  is  not  a  word,  expressed  or  implied,  to 
the  contrary.  And  how  mvich  is  to  be  paid  to  each 
member?  There  is  not  a  word  definitely  to  show. 
But  in  the  next  sentence,  which  oddly  says  that  "  In 
case  of  death  by  injuries  received  while  discharging 
their  duties,  the  annuities  shall  be  continued  to  the 
widows  or  children  or  both,"  the  word  annuities  gives 
us  a  hint  as  to  the  meaning  of  the  law,  but  no  more. 
Yet  it  is  safe  to  say  that  this  section,  which  so  com- 
pletely fails  to  express  a  simple  intention  as  to  the 
payment  of  money  that  any  construction  of  it  might 
be  plausibly  disputed,  was  supposed  by  its  framers 
to  mean  what  it  does  mean  in  the  corrected  form  fol- 
lowing ;  in  which  it  would  have  been  written  by  any 
tolerably  well-instructed  person  —  any  person  of  suffi- 
cient intelligence  and  education  to  be  intrusted  with 
the  writing  of  an  official  letter  —  much  more  the 
drafting  of  a  law. 

"  The  Board  of  Police  is  hereby  authorized  in  its  discretion  to 
pay  out  of  the  Police  Life  Insurance  Fund  an  amount  not  ex- 
ceeding three  hundred  dollars,  annually,  to  every  member  of  the 
force  who  may  be  disabled  while  in  the  discharge  of  Ms  duties. 
In  cases  of  death /?-o//i  injuries  received  in  the  discharge  of  duty, 


28  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

the  annuities  shall  be  paid  to  the  widow  or  the  children  of  the 
deceased  member,  or  to  both,  as  the  Board  may  deem  best.  The 
Board  of  Metropolitan  Police  is  hereby  constituted  the  Trustee 
of  the  Police  Life  Insurance  Fund." 

There  are  laws  of  the  United  States,  enacted  within 
the  last  four  years,  and  which  must  come  up  before 
the  courts,  and  finally  before  the  Supreme  Court,  as 
the  ground  of  the  decision  of  important  questions, 
which  are  not  a  whit  more  explicit  or  coherent  than 
this  example  of  the  style  of  late  New  York  legislation. 

Language  being  perverted  in  this  country  chiefly  in 
consequence  of  the  wide  diffusion  of  very  superficial 
instruction  among  a  restless,  money-getting,  and  self- 
confident  people,  although  the  daily  press  is  the  chief 
visible  corrupter  of  our  speech,  it  must  be  admitted 
that  the  latter  cause  of  degradation  is  itself  the  con- 
sequence of  the  former.  Our  newspapers  do  the  harm 
in  question  through  their  advertisements  as  well  as 
through  their  reports,  their  correspondence,  and  their 
leading  articles ;  and  it  would  seem  as  if,  in  most 
cases,  the  same  degree  of  knowledge  of  the  meaning 
of  words  and  of  their  use  prevailed  in  all  these  depart- 
ments. The  style  and  the  language  of  their  adver- 
tisements and  their  reading  matter  generally  indicate 
the  careless  confidence  of  a  people  among  whom  there 
is  little  deference,  or  reference,  to  standards  of  author- 
ity. Competent  as  some  of  our  editors  are,  none  of 
our  newspapers  receive  thorough  editorial  supervision. 
What  is  sent  to  them  for  publication  would  be  gen- 
erally judged  by  a  low  standard ;  and  of  even  that 
judgment  the  public  too  frequently  has  not  the  bene- 
fit. As  to  advertisements,  every  man  of  us  deems 
himself  able  to  write  them,  with  what  reason  we  shall 
soon  see :  while  in  England  the  writing  of  even  these 


NEWSPAPER  ENGLISH  29 

is  generally  committed  to  persons  who  have  some 
knowledge  of  English  and  some  sense  of  decorum. 
But  here,  the  free,  independent,  and  intelligent  Amer- 
ican citizen  jji'oduces  advertisements  in  which  sense 
and  decorum  are  set  at  naught  with  an  absoluteness 
that  speaks  more  for  his  freedom  and  his  independence 
than  for  his  intelligence.  To  pass  his  ordinary  per- 
formances under  censure  would  be  trivial,  if  not  super- 
fluous ;  there  is,  however,  a  variety  of  his  species  who 
is  not  unworthy  of  attention,  because  he  is  doing  much 
to  debauch  the  public  mind  —  injuring  it  morally  as 
well  as  intellectually.  This  is  the  sensation  adver. 
tiser,  who  sometimes  is  a  publisher,  sometimes  a 
perfumer ;  at  others  he  sells  fire-safes,  bitters,  sewing, 
machines,  buchu,  houses  and  lands,  pianofortes,  or 
clothes-wringers.  But  whatever  his  wares,  his  Eng- 
lish is  generally  vile,  and  his  tone  always  nauseous. 
Here  follows  a  specimen  of  the  sort  of  riff-raff  of  lan- 
guage that  he  jjroduces.  It  is  actually  a  part  of  a 
long  advertisement  of  a  "  real  estate  agent,"  which 
appeared  in  a  leading  paper  in  the  interior  of  New 
York  :  — 

"  I  am  happy  to  inform  my  friends  especially  and  the  public 
generally,  that  I  have  entered  upon  the  new  year  '  as  sound  as  a 
nut.'  My  ambition  is  at  bulkhead  ;  my  best  efPorts  shall  be  de- 
voted to  the  public.  I  am  willing  to  live  on  crumbs  and  small 
fishes,  and  let  others  take  the  loaves  and  sturgeon.  I  am  still 
dealing  largely  in  Real  Estate.  Encouraged  by  success  in  the 
past,  I  shall  buckle  on  the  harness  in  the  future.  Therefore 
'  come  unto  me  '  and  I  will  '  see  '  what  I  can  do  for  you.  I  am 
too  modest  to  speak,  even  in  a  whisper,  in  my  own  behalf,  but  I 
am  willing  the  public  should  speak  in  '  thunder  tones.'  .  .  .  Any 
man  who  really  wants  to  buy  a  farm,  small  or  large,  I  can  suit 
him  ;  also  cheap  houses  and  lots,  also  cheap  vacant  lots.  ...  I 
am  also  looking  after  the  soldier's  interest.  Let  their  widows, 
orphans,  parents,  etc.,  also  the  poor  maimed  soldiers, '  come  unto 


30  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

me  '  for  pensions,  bounties,  etc.,  for  they  have  my  deep-bosomed 
sympathies.  I  have  a  very  cheap  house,  barn  and  very  large 
lot,  with  trees,  and  splendid  garden  land,  some  ten  rods  deep,  to 
sell  at  a  low  figure.     '  Come  and  see.'  " 

This  gentleman,  whose  "  ambition  is  at  bulkhead," 
by  which,  if  he  meant  anything,  he  possibly  meant  at 
flood-tide,  who  tells  any  man  who  wants  to  buy  a  farm 
that  he  can  suit  him,  also  cheap  houses  and  lots,  who 
advertises  his  deep-bosomed  sympathies,  who  calls 
garden-land  splendid,  and  who  interlards  his  hideous 
attempt  at  humorous  humbug  with  phrases  quoted 
from  the  tenderest  and  most  impressive  passages  of 
the  Gospels,  may,  nevertheless,  be  a  decent  sort  of 
person  outwardly,  and  a  shrewd  man  of  business. 
Still,  although  we  may  be  obliged  to  put  a  murderer 
out  of  the  way  as  we  would  a  wild  beast,  the  murderer 
might  be  a  much  more  tolerable  sort  of  person  in 
daily  life,  and  work  less  diffusive  evil  than  this  adver- 
tiser. He  is  sure  to  do  some  harm,  and  if  he  should 
be  a  successful  man,  and  he  probably  will  be,  he  can 
hardly  fail  to  do  a  great  deal.  For  he  will  then  have 
the  more  imitators.  He  is  even  now  the  representa- 
tive of  a  class  of  men  which  increases  among  us  year 
by  year  —  men  whose  chief  traits  are  greed  and  vul- 
garity, who  often  get  riches,  and  whose  traits,  when 
riches  come,  are  still  greed  and  vulgarity,  with  the 
addition  of  purse-pride  and  vanity.  Such  advertising 
as  his  is  a  positive  injury  to  public  morals  and  pub- 
lic taste ;  and  it  is  much  to  be  desired  that  it  could 
be  excluded  from  all  respectable  newspapers.  But  of 
course  this  is  as  impossible  as  it  would  be  to  exclude 
rude,  ill-mannered  people  from  a  hotel.  Our  only 
remedy  is  in  the  diffusion  of  a  knowledge  of  the 
decencies  of  language  and  of  intercourse. 


NEWSPAPER  ENGLISH  31 

As  a  general  rule,  the  higher  the  culture,  the  sim- 
pler the  style  and  the  plainer  the  speech.  But  it  is 
equally  true  that,  for  rudeness  and  positive  coarseness 
in  the  use  of  language,  as  well  as  for  affectation  and 
pretence,  we  must  look  to  our  public  representatives, 
to  the  press,  and  to  the  members  of  our  various  legis- 
lative bodies.  Here,  for  instance,  is  a  paragraph  from 
a  grave  and  very  earnest  leading  article  upon  the  cur- 
rency, which  recently  appeared  in  one  of  the  foremost 
newspapers  in  the  country.  The  subject  of  the  para- 
graph is  a  Treasury  note. 

"  The  United  States  paid  it  out  as  money,  and  received  for  it 
nearly  or  quite  as  much  value  as  though  it  had  been  a  half 
eagle.  We  came  honestly  by  it  and  we  want  it  paid.  Yet,  if 
we  were  to  call  on  Mr.  Sub-Treasurer  Van  Dyke  and  ask  him  to 
fork  over  a  half  eagle  and  take  up  the  rag,  he  would  politely  but 
firmly  decline." 

A  little  racy  slang  may  well  be  used  in  the  course 
of  one's  daily  talk ;  it  sometimes  expresses  that  which 
otherwise  would  be  difficult,  if  not  impossible,  of 
expression.  But  what  is  gained  in  this  case  by  the 
use  of  the  very  coarse  slang  "  fork  over  "  and  "  take 
up  the  rag  "  ?  What  do  these  phrases  express  that 
is  not  quite  as  well  conveyed  in  the  words  cash  the 
note,  and  pay  the  note  in  gold  ?  It  is  quite  impossible 
to  believe  that  this  offence  was  committed  in  igno- 
rance, and  equally  so,  I  hope,  that  it  was  affected 
with  the  purpose  of  writing  down  to  the  level  of  a  cer- 
tain class  of  readers  —  a  trick  which  may  win  their 
present  favor,  but  which,  in  the  end,  they  are  sure  to 
resent.  It  is  rather  to  be  assumed  that  this  phrase- 
ology was  used  only  with  that  careless  indifference  to 
the  decencies  of  life  and  of  language  which  some  jour- 
nalists mistake  for  smartness. 


32  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

Such  a  use  of  language  as  that  which  has  just  been 
made  the  subject  of  remark,  although  common  in  our 
newspapers,  in  Congress,  in  our  state  legislatures, 
and  even  in  the  pulpits  of  certain  religious  denomina- 
tions, is  not  a  national  peculiarity.  On  the  contrary, 
there  are,  probably,  more  people  in  this  country  than 
in  any  other  to  whom  such  a  style  of  writing  and 
speaking  is  a  positive  offence.  But  the  wide  diffusion 
of  just  so  much  instruction  as  enables  men  to  read 
their  newspapers,  write  their  advertisements,  and 
keep  their  accounts,  and  the  utter  lack  of  deference 
to  any  one,  or  of  doubt  in  themselves,  which  political 
equality  and  material  prosperity  beget  in  people  hav- 
ing no  more  than  such  education,  and  no  less,  combine 
to  produce  a  condition  of  society  which  brings  their 
style  of  speech,  as  well  as  their  manners,  much  more 
to  the  front,  not  to  say  to  the  top,  than  is  the  case  in 
other  countries. 


CHAPTER  in 

BRITISH   ENGLISH    AND   "  AMERICAN  "  ENGLISH 

It  has  been  frequently  asserted  by  British  critics 
that  even  among  the  best  educated  people  and  the 
very  men  of  letters  in  the  United  States,  the  English 
language  is  neither  written  nor  spoken  with  the  clear- 
ness and  strength  and  the  mastery  of  idiom  that  are 
common  among  the  people  of  Great  Britain.  Bou- 
cher, in  his  "  Glossary,"  speaks  of  "  Americans "  as 
"  making  all  the  haste  they  can  to  rid  themselves  c/ 
the  [English]  language ;  '*  ^  and  Dean  Alford  makes 
a  like  charge  in  a  passage  of  his  "  Queen's  English," 
which,  no  less  for  its  reasoning  than  for  its  assertions, 
deserves  entire  reproduction.  It  would  be  ruthless  to 
mar  so  complete  and  so  exquisite  a  whole. 

"  Look,  to  take  one  familiar  example,  at  the  process  of  deterio- 
ration which  our  Queen's  English  has  undergone  at  the  hands 
of  the  Americans.  Look  at  those  phrases  which  so  amuse  us  in 
their  speech  and  in  their  books ;  at  their  reckless  exaggeration 
and  contempt  for  congruity;  and  then  compare  the  character 
and  history  of  the  nation  — its  blunted  sense  of  moral  obligation 
and  duty  to  man,  its  open  disregard  of  conventional  right,  where 
aggrandizement  is  to  be  obtained ;  and  I  may  now  say  its  reck- 
less and  fruitless  maintenance  of  the  most  cruel  and  unprinci- 
pled war  in  the  history  of  the  world." 

^  Quoted  from  Scheie  de  Vere.  Boucher's  Glossary,  which 
was  designed  as  a  supplement  to  Johnson's  Dictionary,  I  have 
not  read. 


34  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

Some  of  our  own  writers,  blindly  following,  I  think, 
blind  British  guides,  have  been  misled  into  the  expres- 
sion of  like  oj)inions.  Mr.  Lowell,  in  the  preface  to 
his  second  series  of  the  "  Biglow  Papers,"  makes  this 
damaijino:  admission :  — 

"  Whether  it  be  want  of  culture,  for  the  highest  outcome  of 
culture  is  simplicity,  or  for  whatever  reason,  it  is  certain  that 
very  few  American  writers  and  speakers  wield  their  native  lan- 
guage with  the  directness,  precision,  and  force  that  are  as  com- 
mon as  the  day  in  the  mother  country." 

Speaking  upon  the  careful  observation  of  several 
years,  I  cannot  admit  the  justice  of  this  self-accusa- 
tion ;  and  I  must  express  no  little  surprise  at  the  lack 
of  qualification  and  reserve  in  Mr.  Lowell's  language, 
which  I  can  account  for  only  by  supposing  that  his 
opinion  was  formed  upon  an  insufficient  examination 
of  this  subject.  It  is  true  that  the  writers  and 
speakers  of  that  very  large  class  among  us  who  are 
neither  learned  nor  unlearned,  and  who  are,  therefore, 
on  the  one  hand  without  the  simplicity  that  comes  of 
culture,  and  on  the  otJier  incapable  of  that  unconscious, 
intuitive  use  of  idiom  which  gives  life  and  strength  to 
the  simple  speech  of  very  humble  people,  do,  most  of 
them,  use  language  awkwardly,  and  as  if  they  did  not 
feel  at  home  in  their  own  mother  tongue.  If  it  were 
not  so  this  book  would  lack  one  reason  of  its  being. 
But  I  do  not  hesitate  to  say  that  British  writers,  not 
of  the  highest  grade,  but  of  respectable  rank,  are  open 
to  the  same  charge ;  and,  moreover,  that  it  is  more 
generally  true  with  regard  to  them  than  with  regard 
to  writers  of  the  same  position  in  the  United  States. 

Mr.  Marsh,  in  the  last  of  his  admirable  "  Lectures 
on  the  English  Language,"  expresses  an  opinion 
which,  on  the  whole,  is  more  nearly  like  that  which  I 


BRITISH   AND   "AMERICAN"   ENGLISH         35 

have  formed  than  Mr.  Lowell's,  not  to  say  Dean  Al- 
ford's.     But  Mr.  Marsh  himself  has  this  passage :  — 

"  In  general,  I  think  we  may  say  that,  in  point  of  naked  syn- 
tactical accuracy,  the  English  of  America  is  not  at  all  inferior  to 
that  of  England  ;  but  we  do  not  discriminate  so  precisely  in  the 
meaning  of  words  ;  nor  do  we  habitually,  either  in  conversation 
or  in  writing,  express  ourselves  so  gracefully  or  employ  so  classic 
a  diction  as  the  English.  Our  t<aste  in  langiuige  is  less  fastidious, 
and  our  licenses  and  inaccuracies  are  more  frequently  of  a  char- 
acter indicative  of  a  want  of  refinement  and  elegant  culture  than 
those  we  hear  in  educated  society  in  England." 

But  here  Mr.  Marsh  himself  indicates  the  point  of 
my  objection  to  all  these  criticisms.  He  compares  our 
average  speech  with  that  of  educated  society  in  the 
mother  country.  By  such  a  comparison  it  would  be 
strange  if  we  did  not  suffer.  The  just  and  proper 
comparison  would  be  between  the  average  speech  of 
both  countries,  or  between  that  of  people  of  equal  cul- 
ture in  both. 

Among  living  writers  few  have  easier  mastery  of 
idiomatic  English  than  Mr.  Lowell  himself ;  and  set- 
ting aside  peculiar  gifts,  as  imagination,  fancy,  humor, 
many  New  England  men  of  the  present  generation 
and  of  that  which  is  passing  away  are  of  his  school, 
if  not  of  his  form.  There  have  been  abler  states- 
men and  more  accomplished  lawyers,  but  has  this  cen- 
tury produced  anywhere  a  greater  rhetorical  master 
of  English  than  Daniel  Webster  ?  While  Hawthorne 
lived,  —  and  his  grave  is  not  yet  as  green  as  his  mem- 
ory, —  was  there  a  British  writer  who  used  with  greater 
purity  or  more  plastic  power  the  language  that  we 
brought  with  us  from  the  old  home  ?  Our  very  kins- 
men themselves,  proud  in  their  possession  of  the  old 
homestead,  the  plate,  the  books,  and  the  portraits, 
made  no  such  pretension  ;  but  they  settled  the  question 


36  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

for  their  own  minds,  by  saying  that  Hawthorne  "  was 
not  really  an  American  writer."  And  Hawthorne's 
case  is  not  singular  in  this  respect.  The  "  Saturday 
Review,"  in  an  article  upon  what  it  calls  "  American 
Literature,"  recently  said :  — 

"  There  is  very  little  that  is  American  about  American  books, 
if  we  except  certain  blemishes  of  style  and  a  certain  slovenliness 
of  grammar  and  clumsiness  of  expression  derived  from  the  colo- 
nial idioms  of  the  country  ;  and  these  are  wanting  in  the  best 
American  loriters.  Longfellow,  Motley,  Prescott,  Washington 
Irving  are  only  English  writers  icho  happen  to  print  in  America. 
Poe's  eccentricities  are  rather  individual  than  national.  Cooper 
is  American  in  little  but  his  choice  of  subjects."  ^ 

And  not  long  ago  the  London  "  Spectator,"  which 
ought  to  have  known  better,  declared  that  it  is  not 
among  the  eminent  historians,  poets,  and  essayists  of 
America  that  we  must  look  for  American  style,  but  to 
the  journalists,  politicians,  and  pamphleteers.  A  more 
ingenious  way  of  establishing  a  point  to  one's  own 
satisfaction  than  that  adopted  by  both  these  British 
critics  could  not  be  devised.  Proposition:  The 
"  American  "  style  is  full  of  blemishes  ;  it  is  slovenly 
in  grammar  and  clumsy  in  expression.  Reply :  But 
here  are  certain  historians,  novelists,  poets,  and  essay- 
ists, who  are  the  standard  writers  of  "  America  "  and 
in  whose  style  the  blemishes  in  question,  as  you  your- 
self admit,  "  are  wanting."  Rejoinder :  But  these 
are  not  "  American "  writers.  They  are  English 
writers  who  happen  to  print  in  "  America."  The 
"  American  "  writers  in  "  America  "  are  those  only 
who  have  the  blemishes  in  question.  Q.  E.  D.  What 
a  bewitching  merry-go-round  such  reasoning  is  !    And 

*  I  am  glad  to  read  this  about  Cooper.  I  shall  fight  with  no 
one  for  possession  of  his  literary  fame. 


BRITISH  AND   "AMERICAN"   ENGLISH         37 

so  perfect !  It  stops  exactly  at  the  point  from  which  it 
started. 

Without  picking  out  my  exemplars,  I  will  take  up 
the  last  two  books  by  British  authors  that  I  have  read 
for  pleasure  —  both  by  men  of  note  —  Mr.  Jolni 
Forster's  "  Arrest  of  the  Five  Members,"  and  Mr. 
Fronde's  "  History  of  England,"  and  turning  to  pas- 
sages which  I  remember  noticing  amid  all  my  interest 
in  the  narratives  themselves,  I  quote ;  and  first  from 
Forster :  — 

"  Since  his  coining  to  town  he  had  been  greatly  pleased  to  ob- 
serve a  very  great  alteration  of  the  affections  of  the  city  to  what 
they  had  been  when  he  went  away."  —  p.  21. 

This  is  not  English,  or  at  least  it  is  English  wretch- 
edly deformed  and  crippled.  If  the  affections  of  the 
city  were  altered  to  what  they  were  when  the  person 
spoken  of  went  away,  it  is  implied  that  there  had  been 
two  changes  during  his  absence,  one  from  the  condition 
in  which  he  left  the  city,  and  one  again  to  that  in 
which  he  left  it.  We  have  to  guess  that  the  writer 
meant  that  the  person  in  question  observed  a  very 
great  change  in  the  affections  of  the  city  since  he  went 
away.  The  blunder  in  the  bungling  phrase  "  alteration 
of  the  affections  to  what  they  had  been,"  which  is  a  vari- 
ety of  the  phrase  "  different  to,"  is  peculiarly  British. 

The  faults  in  the  two  following  passages  are  such 
as  are  found  in  the  writings  of  natives  of  both 
countries  :  — 

"  Nor  was  it  possible  that  Charles  himself  should  have  drawn 
any  other  construction  from  it.  \_Anglice,  put  any  other  con- 
struction upon  it.]  "  —  p.  23. 

"  Captain  Slingsby  wrote,  witli  an  alarm  which  he  hardly 
attempts  \_Angl.,  attempted]  to  conceal,  of  tlie  displays  of  mani- 
festations of  feeling /rom  the  city."  —  p.  28. 


38  WORDS  AND   THEIR  USES 

Could  the  reverse  of  directness  and  precision,  to  say 
nothing  of  force,  have  more  striking  example  than 
such  a  phrase  as  "  the  displays  of  manifestations  of 
feeling  from  the  city  ? "  which  we  may  be  sure  any 
intelligent  and  passably  educated  Yankee  lad  would 
change  into  "  manifestations  of  feeling  by  [or  in]  the 
city."  Now  let  us  turn  to  Froude,  whose  slips  will 
be  pointed  out  almost  without  remark  :  — 

"  She  [Elizabeth]  gave  him  to  understand  that  her  course  was 
chosen  at  last;  she  would  accept  the  Archduke,  and  would  be  all 
which  \_Angl.,  that]  the  Emperor  could  desire."  —  Vol.  VIII., 
ch.  X. 

"  The  English  Admiral  was  scarcely  in  the  Channel  than  he 
was  driven  \_Angl.,  before  he  was  driven]  by  a  gale  into  Lowe- 
stoft Roads,  and  was  left  there  for  a  fortnight  motionless."  — 
Vol.  VII.,  ch.  iii. 

"  A  husband,  on  receiving  news  of  the  sudden  and  violent 
death  of  a  lady  in  whom  he  had  so  near  an  interest,  might  have 
been  expected  to  have  at  least  gone  \_Angl.,  might  have  been  ex- 
pected at  least  to  go]  in  person  to  the  spot."  —  Vol.  VII.,  c.  4. 

"  The  Pope  might  succeed,  and  most  likely  would  succeed  at 
last  in  reconciling  Spain;  and  experience  proved  that  England 
lay  formidably  open  \_Angl.,  perilously  or  alarmingly  open]  to 
attack."  —  Vol.  III.,  ch.  xiv. 

"  At  eight  o'clock  the  advance  began  to  move,  each  division 
being  attended  by  one  hundred  and  twenty  outriders  to  keep 
stragglers  into  line  \_Angl.,  in  line.]  "  —  Vol.  III.,  ch.  xv. 

"  If  the  tragedy  of  Kirk  a  Field  had  possessed  a  claim  for 
notice  ^AngL,  to  notice]  on  the  first  of  these  grounds,"  etc. 
Vol.  IX.,  ch.  xiii.,  p.  1. 

"  Elizabeth  regarded  this  unfortunate  woman  with  a  detesta- 
tion a7id  contempt  beyond  ivhat  she  had  felt  at  the  worst  times 
for  Mary  Stuart.  [Angl.,  with  far  greater  detestation  and  con- 
tempt than  she  had  ever  felt  for  Mary  Stuart.]  "  —  Ibid.,  p.  21. 

"  —  and  those  who  were  apparently  as  guilty  as  Bothwell 
himself  were  yet  assuming  an  attitude  to  him  \_Angl.,  toward 
him]  at  one  moment  of  cringing  subserviency  [a  writer  of  Mr. 
Fronde's  grade  should  have  said  "  subservience  "],  and  at  th* 
next  of  the  fiercest  indignation."  —  Ibid.,  p.  26. 


BRITISH   AND   "AMERICAN"   ENGLISH         39 

"  —  and  had  Darnley  proved  the  useful  Catholic  which  tho 
Queen  intended  him  to  be,  they  would  have  sent  him  to  his 
account  with  as  small  compunction  as  Jael  se>it  the  Canaanite 
captain,  or  they  would  have  blessed  the  arm  that  did  it  with  as 
much  eloquence  as  Deborah."  —  Ibid.,  ch.  xiv.,  p.  127. 

Here,  to  get  at  the  writer's  meaning  from  what  he 
has  written,  we  must  ask.  How  small  compunction  did 
Jael  send  the  Canaanite  captain  ?  and,  What  degree 
of  eloquence  did  the  arm  attain  that  did  it  with  as 
much  as  Deborah  ?  What  was  it  ?  and  how  much 
eloquence  is  Deborah  ?  The  sentence  is  so  marked 
with  slovenliness  of  grammar  and  clumsiness  of  ex- 
pression, it  is  so  lacking  in  directness,  precision,  and 
force,  that  it  can  be  bettered  only  by  being  almost 
wholly  rewritten.  We  are  all  able  to  guess,  but  only 
to  guess,  that  what  Mr.  Froude  means  is,  that  the  per- 
sons of  whom  he  speaks  would  have  sent  Darnley  to 
his  account  with  as  little  compunction  as  Jael  felt 
when  she  sent  tlie  Canaanite  captain  to  his,  or  would 
have  blessed  with  the  eloquence  of  Deborah  the  arm 
that  did  their  pleasure.  The  blundering  construction 
of  which  this  last  passage  furnishes  such  a  striking 
example  is  of  a  kind  frequently  met  with  in  British 
writers  of  a  rank  inferior  to  Mr.  Fronde's  ;  but  it  is 
rarely  found  in  "  American  "  books  or  even  in  "  Amer- 
ican "  newspapers.  Fi'oni  Mr.  Froude  I  shall  further 
select  only  the  three  following  passages  ;  the  first  con- 
taining a  misuse  of  would  and  which  —  test  words  as 
to  the  mastery  of  idiom  —  the  second  a  specimen  of 
French  English,  and  the  third  combining  a  misaj)- 
plication  of  words  with  a  misconstruction  of  the 
sentence  :  — 

"  The  Bishop  of  Ross  undertook  that  his  mistress  would  do 
anything  tvhich  [Angl.,  should  do  anything  that]  the  Queen  of 
England  and  the  nobility  desired."  —  ch.  xvii.,  p.  432. 


» 


40  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

"  Hepburn  of  Bolton,  one  of  the  last  of  Bothwell's  servants 
who  had  been  brought  to  trial,  spoke  distinctly  to  have  seen 
\_Angl.,  of  having  seen]  one  of  them."  —  ch.  xv.,  p.  199. 

"  Edward  IV.,  when  he  landed  at  Ravenspurg,  and  Elizabeth's 
grandfather  before  Bos  worth  Field  h&di.  fainter  grounds  to  antici- 
pate success  than  the  party  who  was  now  preparing  to  snatch 
England  out  of  the  hands  of  revolution,  and  restore  the  ancient 
order  in  Church  and  State."  —  ch.  xvii.,  p.  73. 

A  man  may  be  said  to  have  grounds  on  which  to 
rest  hope  of  success,  or  anticipation  of  success  ;  or 
even,  perhaps^  grounds  of  anticipating  success  ;  and 
those  grounds  may  be  strong  or  weak,  sufficient  or 
insufficient ;  but  such  a  phrase  as  "  fainter  grounds 
to  anticipate  success,"  in  its  misuse  of  the  infinitive, 
must  be  pronounced  slovenly,  and  in  its  vague,  grop- 
ing way  of  handling  a  metaphor  so  common  as  to  be 
almost  an  idiom,  clumsy.  But  how  much  worse  than 
this  is  the  succeeding  phrase,  "the  party  who  was  now 
preparing,"  etc. !  It  would  have  been  easy,  it  seems, 
to  write  "  the  party  which  was  now  preparing,"  or, 
"  the  party  who  were  now  preparing,"  and  to  one  of 
these  forms  Mr.  Froude  must  change  his  sentence  if 
he  wishes  it  to  be  English  ;  unless,  indeed,  he  means 
to  speak  of  the  Duke  of  Norfolk  (the  head  of  the  rev- 
olution in  question)  as  a  very  dangerous  "  party." 

Turning  to  the  books  and  papers  lying  on  my  table, 
I  find  two  novels  by  British  authors  of  well-deserved 
repute. 

Mr.  Trollope's  "  Phineas  Finn  "  is  full  of  examples 
of  the  following  affected  and  inverted  construction :  — 

"  He  felt  that  she  moved  him  —  that  she  made  him  acknow- 
ledge to  himself  how  great  would  be  the  pity  of  such  a  failure  as 
would  be  his."  —  ch.  Ixix. 

"  —  one  who  had  received  so  many  of  her  smiles  as  had  Phv> 
neas,"  —  ch.  Ixxii. 


m 


BRITISH  AND   "AMERICAN"  ENGLISH         41 

The  same  writer,  in  the  following  sentence,  falls  in 
with  a  vulgar  perversion  of  aggravate^  using  it  in  the 
sense  of  irritate,  worry  :  — 

"  This  arose  partly  from  a  belief  that  the  quarrel  was  final, 
and  that  therefore  there  would  be  no  danger  in  aggravating  Vio- 
let by  this  expression  of  pity."  —  ch.  Ixxiii. 

Mr.  Charles  Reade's  last  novel  furnishes  in  only  one 
of  its  monthly  parts  the  following  sentences  :  — 

"  Well,  farmer,  then  let 's  you  and  /  go  \_Angl'.,  let 's  go,  or,  let 
you  and  me  go]  by  ourselves." — Put  Yourself  in  his  Place, 
ch.  X. 

"  And  while  he  hesitated,  the  lady  asked  him  was  he  come 
[^Angl.,  if  he  was,  or,  if  he  had,  come]  to  finish  the  bust."  — 
Ibid. 

"  Ere  he  thoroughly  recovered  the  shock  \_Angl.,  recovered  from 
the  shock]  a  wild  cry  arose."  —  Ibid. 

Mr.  Reade  is  one  of  the  most  vivid  and  dramatic 
of  modern  novelists  ;  but  are  these  examples  of  the 
directness,  precision  and  force,  and  the  mastery  of 
idiom,  which  are  "  as  common  as  the  day  in  the 
mother  country  "  ? 

Taking  up  the  last  London  "  Spectator,"  —  a  paper 
of  the  very  highest  rank,  —  I  find  this  sentence  in  a 
careful,  critical  review  of  Lightfoot's  "  Saint  Paul's 
Epistle  to  the  Galatians  :  "  — 

"  But  we  must  return  to  the  Galatians.  We  are  called  on  to 
believe  that  the  inspiration  of  this  letter  derives  from  a  wholly 
different  source  than  does  that  of  the  apostles.  \_Angl.,  is  de- 
rived from  a  source  wholly  different  from  that  of  the  apostles.]  " 

In  the  same  copy  of  the  "  Spectator,"  I  also  find 
the  following  amazing  sentences  among  the  quotations 
from  "  Select  Biographical  Sketches,"  by  William 
Heath   Bennett.      The  passage    relates   to   the   last 


42  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

known  instance  of  the  infliction  of  ecclesiastical  pen- 
ance in  England,  which  took  place  in  1812. 

"  She  was  herself  a  pauper,  and  her  father  also,  but  who  had 
managed  to  contribute  to  her  maintenance  in  jail  from  the  char- 
ity of  others.  This  sentence  of  penance,  although  pronounced 
in  general  terms,  her  friends  could  never  obtain  from  the  eccle- 
siastical authorities  how  it  was  to  be  complied  with,  except  that 
she  was  to  appear  in  a  white  sheet  in  the  church  with  a  burning 
candle  in  her  hand,  and  repeat  some  formula  prescribed  by  tho 
old  law." 

The  reviewer  quotes  other  passages  which  support 
his  opinion  that  the  style  of  this  book  is  slipshod  and 
often  ungrammatical.  But  the  author  is  a  barrister 
at  law,  and  might  reasonably  be  expected  to  write 
intelligibly,  if  not  elegantly.  Had  he  been,  how- 
ever, not  a  British,  but  an  "  American  "  lawyer,  the 
"  Spectator  "  and  the  "  Saturday  Review,"  the  Dean 
of  Canterbury  (and  shall  we  say  Mr.  Lowell  ?)  would 
have  pronounced  his  style  not  slipshod  and  ungram- 
matical, but  "  American  "  —  in  a  certain  slovenliness 
of  manner  and  clumsiness  of  expression,  and  in  a  lack 
of  precision,  distinctness,  and  force,  that  are  as  com- 
mon as  the  day  in  the  mother  country.  How  common 
they  are  the  reader  is  now,  perhaps,  better  prepared 
to  say  than  he  was  before  he  began  to  read  this  chap- 
ter. For  the  passages  above  quoted  are  selected  from 
many  that  were  open  to  like  censure  ;  and  they  were 
chosen  less  because  of  the  gravity  of  their  offences 
against  the  laws  of  the  English  language  than  because 
they  were  impressive  examples  of  the  lack  of  the  vei'y 
qualities  which,  Mr.  Lowell  tells  us,  are  so  common 
in  England,  and  the  lack  of  which  the  "Saturday 
Review,"  Dean  Alford,  and  all  of  their  sort  will  have 
it,  are  the  peculiar,  the  distinguishing  traits  of  those 


BRITISH  AND  "AMERICAN"   ENGLISH         43 

writers  whom  they  call  "  American."  And  these  pas- 
sages were  not  sought  out,  it  should  be  remembered  ; 
nor  are  they,  most  of  them,  taken  from  the  writings 
of  inferior  men.  They  lay  in  the  way  of  every-day 
reading,  and  are  from  books  and  papers  of  high  rank 
in  contemporary  British  literature.  Yet  I  venture  to 
say  that  it  would  be  difficult  to  find  in  the  writings  of 
"  American  "  authors  and  journalists  of  corresponding 
position  passages  in  which  mastery  of  idiom,  direct- 
ness, precision,  and  force  are  as  conspicuously  absent. 
Let  us,  for  one  more  example  in  point,  turn  to  a  Brit- 
ish author  of  less  repute  than  Mr.  Forster,  or  Mr. 
Froude,  or  Mr.  Charles  Reade,  but  of  respectable 
standing,  and  turn  to  him  merely  because  he  may  rea- 
sonably be  taken  as  a  fair  example  of  the  British 
writer  of  average  literary  ability  and  culture,  and  be- 
cause the  passage  which  I  shall  quote  is  one  of  two  or 
three  which  I  noticed  while  consulting  the  work  from 
which  it  is  taken  —  the  well-known  Natural  History 
by  the  Rev.  J.  G.  Wood,  M.  A.,  F.  L.  S.,  etc.,  etc. 

"  All  external  objects  are,  in  their  truest  sense,  visible  em- 
bodiments or  incarnations  of  divine  ideas,  which  are  roughly 
sculptured  in  the  hard  granite  that  underlies  the  living  and 
breathing  surface  of  the  world  above  ;  pencilled  in  delicate  tra- 
cery upon  each  bark-flake  that  encompasses  the  trunk-tree,  each 
leaf  that  trembles  in  the  breeze,  each  petal  that  fills  the  air  with 
fragrant  effluence;  assuming  a  living  and  breathing  existence  in 
the  rhythmic  throbbings  of  the  heart-pulse  that  urges  the  life- 
stream  through  the  body  of  every  animated  being  ;  and  attain- 
ing their  greatest  perfection  in  man,  who  is  thereby  bound  by 
the  very  fact  of  his  existence  to  outspeak  and  outact  the  divine 
ideas,  which  are  the  true  instincts  of  humanity,  before  they  are 
crushed  or  paralyzed  by  outward  circumstances.  .  .  .  Until 
man  has  learned  to  realize  his  own  microcosmal  being,  and  will 
himself  develop  and  manifest  the  god-thoughts  that  are  continu- 
ally inbreathed  into  his  very  essential  nature,  it  needs  that  the 


44  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

creative  ideas  should  be  incarnated  and  embodied  in  every  pos- 
sible form,  so  that  they  may  retain  a  living  existence  upon 
earth." 

Any  Yankee  of  ordinary  sense  and  moderately  cul- 
tivated taste  would  set  this  passage  down  as  a  fine 
specimen  of  stilted  feebleness  —  in  its  style  a  very  trav- 
esty of  English.  But  it  was  written  by  a  clergyman 
of  the  English  church,  a  graduate  of  one  of  the  uni- 
versities, a  man  who  has  attained  some  distinction  as 
a  naturalist,  and  who  has  half  a  score  of  letters  after 
his  name.  The  truth  is,  that  when  the  English  of 
British  authors  is  spoken  of,  it  is  not  that  of  such 
writers  as  Mr.  Wood,  but  that  of  —  well,  of  such 
as  Forster  and  Froude  ?  —  let  us  say  rather  of  such 
as  Macaulay,  Thackeray,  Helps,  and  George  Eliot,  as 
Johnson,  Burke,  Hume,  Gibbon,  Goldsmith,  and  Cob- 
bett.  But  when  British  critics  speak  of  the  English 
of  "  American  "  writers,  they  leave  out  Irving,  Pres- 
cott,  and  Motley,  Hawthorne,  Poe,  and  Longfellow, 
as  we  have  seen,  and  others  less  known,  like  Lowell, 
Story,  and  Howells,  who  write  in  the  same  idiom  ; 
and  they  look  for  "  American "  writers,  not  even 
among  our  thoroughly  educated  men  of  letters  of  the 
second  or  third  rank,  but  to  newspapers,  written  gen- 
erally by  men  of  average  common-school  education, 
little  training,  and  no  gift  of  language,  and  for  the 
heterogeneous  public  of  the  large  cities  of  a  country 
in  which  every  other  Irish  hackman  and  hodman 
keeps  not  only  his  police  justice,  but  his  editor.  That 
there  are  journalists  in  this  country  whose  English  is 
irreproachable,  no  one  competent  to  speak  upon  this 
subject  will  deny.  But  they  are  they  who  will  admit 
most  readily  the  justice  of  these  strictures. 

Upon  the  vexed  question  whether,  on  the  whole, 


BRITISH  AND  "AMERICAN"  ENGLISH         46 

English  is  better  spoken  throughout  the  United 
States  than  throughout  Great  Britain,  I  do  not  deem 
myself  competent  to  express  a  decided  opinion  ;  but 
of  this  I  feel  sure  —  that  of  the  mother-tongue  com- 
mon to  the  people  of  both  countries,  no  purer  form 
is  known  to  the  Old  England  than  to  the  New.  If 
in  an  assemblage  of  a  hundred  educated,  well-bred 
people,  one  half  of  them  from  London,  Oxford,  and 
Liverpool,  and  the  other  from  Boston,  New  York, 
and  Philadelphia  (and  I  have  more  than  once  been 
one  of  a  company  so  composed,  although  not  so 
large),  a  ready  and  accurate  phonographer  were  to 
take  down  every  word  spoken  during  an  evening's 
entertainment,  I  feel  quite  sure  that  it  would  be  im- 
possible to  distinguish  in  his  printed  report  the  speech 
of  the  Britons  from  that  of  the  "  Americans,"  ex- 
cept by  the  possible  occurrence  of  acknowledged  local 
slang,  or  by  the  greater  prevalence  among  the  former 
or  the  latter  of  peculiar  words,  or  words  used  in  pecu- 
liar senses,  which  would  be  acknowledged  to  be  incor- 
rect as  well  by  the  authorities  of  the  party  using  them 
as  by  those  of  the  other  party.  In  brief,  their  spoken 
language,  reproduced  instantly  in  writing,  coidd  be 
distinguished  only  by  some  confessed  license  or  defect, 
peculiar  to  one  country,  or  more  prevalent  there  than 
in  the  other.  And  I  am  strongly  inclined  to  the  opin- 
ion that,  the  assemblage  being  made  up  of  educated 
and  well-bred  persons,  there  would  be  somewhat  more 
slang  heard  from  the  British  than  from  the  "  Ameri- 
can "  half  of  the  company,  and  also  a  greater  number 
of  free  and  easy  deviations  from  correct  English 
speech,  according  to  British  as  well  as  "  American  " 
authority.  The  standard  in  both  countries  is  the 
same. 


46  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

But  although  the  written  speech  of  these  people 
would  be  to  this  degree  indistinguishable,  an  ear  at 
all  nice  in  its  hearing  would  be  able  to  separate  the 
sheep  from  the  goats  by  their  bleat.  The  difference 
would  be  one  not  of  pronunciation  (for  the  standard 
of  pronunciation  is  also  the  same  in  both  countries, 
and  well-educated  people  in  both  conform  to  it  with 
like  habitual  and  unconscious  ease),  but  of  pitch  of 
voice,  and  of  inflection.  Among  those  of  both  coun- 
tries who  had  been  from  their  birth  accustomed  to 
the  society  of  cultivated  people,  even  this  distinction 
would  be  made  with  difficulty,  and  would,  in  many 
cases,  be  impossible.  But  the  majority  of  one  half 
hundred  could  thus  be  distinguished  from  the  majority 
of  the  other ;  and  the  superiority  would  be  greatly  on 
the  side  of  the  British  fifty.  The  pitch  of  the  British 
Englishman's  voice  is  higher  and  more  penetrating 
than  the  American  Englishman's,  and  his  inflections 
are  more  varied  than  the  other's,  because  they  more 
frequently  rise.  The  voice  of  the  former  is  generally 
formed  higher  in  the  throat  than  that  of  the  latter, 
who  speaks  from  the  chest  with  a  graver  monotone. 
Thackeray  and  Goldwin  Smith  are  characteristic  ex- 
amples on  the  one  side,  Daniel  Webster  and  Henry 
Ward  Beecher  on  the  other.  The  distinction  to  a 
delicate  ear  is  very  marked ;  but  other  difference  than 
this  of  pitch  and  inflection  there  is  none  whatever. 
Pronunciation  is  exactly  the  same.  And  even  in 
regard  to  pitch  and  inflection,  there  is  not  so  much 
difference  between  the  average  British  Englishman  of 
culture  and  the  average  American  Englishman  of  like 
training,  as  there  is  between  the  Yorkshireman  and 
the  Norfolkman  ;  and  there  is  very  much  more  differ- 
ence between  the  pronunciation  and  the  idiom  of  the 


BRITISH   AND   "AMERICAN"   ENGLISH         47 

two  latter  than  there  is  between  the  speech  of  any  two 
men  of  the  same  race  born  and  bred,  however  remotely 
from  each  other,  in  this  country. 

In  imagining  my  assemblage  by  which  to  test  speech 
and  language,  I  have  left  altogether  out  of  mind  those 
jieople  who,  in  one  country,  would,  for  instance,  deal 
hardly  with  the  letter  A,  or, turn  the  g  in  "nothing" 
to  ^,  and  the  v  in  "  veal  "  to  ^o,^  although  this  class 
includes,  as  I  have  noticed,  and  as  Dean  Alford  con- 
fesses, some  clergymen  of  the  Church  of  England ; 
and,  in  the  other,  those  who  speak  with  a  nasal  twang, 
although  this  class  includes,  as  we  all  know,  some 
persons  of  similar  position  in  "America."  The  point 
is,  that  those  who  would  be  regarded,  in  their  own 
country,  as  among  the  best  speakers  and  writers,  eon- 
form  to  precisely  the  same  standard  of  language  in  all 
particulars.  From  the  speech  of  these  the  variations 
in  both  countries,  but  chiefly  in  England,  are  mani- 
fold. It  is  in  these  variations,  degraded  or  dialectic, 
that  local,  or  what  may  be  called  national,  peculiarities 
appear.  But,  in  judging  of  the  degree  of  purity  in 
which  our  mother  tongue  is  preserved  by  our  British 
kinsmen,  we  must  judge  only  by  those  among  them 
whose  speech  they  themselves  regard  as  pure.  To  do 
otherwise  would  be  manifestly  unfair.  And  in  trying 
ourselves  upon  this  point  we  must  be  careful  to  form 
our  opinion  by  a  like  rule  of  evidence  ;  otherwise  we 
may  find  ourselves  condemning  the  nation  upon  the 
language  of  a  man  who  fifteen  or  twenty  years  ago 

*  Theodore  Hook  thus  wittily  illustrated  this  peculiar  mispro- 
nunciation :  — 

"  With  Cockney  gourmands  great  's  tlie  difference  whether 
At  home  they  stay  or  forth  to  Paris  go  ; 
For  as  they  linger  here  or  wander  thither, 
The  flesh  of  calves  to  them  is  weal  or  wtan.'''' 


48  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

was  an  oysterman  or  a  bar-tender,  and  who  since  that 
time  has  added  much  to  his  possessions,  but  nothing 
to  his  general  knowledge  or  his  right  use  of  language 

—  a  change  which,  however  profitable  and  pleasant  it 
may  be  to  his  children,  seems  in  him  deplorable. 

Dean  Alford  makes  merry  over  a  story  of  an 
"  American  friend  "  who  ventured  to  speak,  in  Eng- 
land, of  the  "  strong  English  accent "  which  he  heard 
around  him.  The  dean  evidently  thinks  that  this  is 
quite  as  if  an  Englishman  were  to  go  to  France,  and 
tell  the  people  there,  in  the  "  French  of  Stratford  at 
Bow,"  that  they  spoke  with  a  strong  French  accent. 
It  is  nothing  of  the  sort.  An  educated  Genevan 
Frenchman,  for  instance,  visiting  Paris,  and  offended 

—  as  well  he  might  be  —  by  the  accent  of  the  mass 
of  the  people  around  him,  might  complain  of  the 
strong  Parisian  accent  with  which  they  spoke  ;  and 
this  case  would  correspond  to  that  which  the  Dean  of 
Canterbury  has  cited.  Should  it  happen,  however,  I 
doubt  if  a  French  dignitary  of  the  church  would  flout 
the  objection  on  the  ground  that  Paris  is  in  France 
and  Geneva  in  Switzerland ;  for  lie  would  know,  as  a 
general  truth,  that  language  belongs  to  race,  not  to 
place,  and  as  a  particular  fact,  that  the  best  French 
is  spoken  at  Geneva. 

The  English  accent  which  Dean  Alford's  "  Ameri- 
can "  friend  noticed  with  implied  disapproval,  — 
although  common,  and  even  general,  among  South 
Britons  (it  rarely  taints  North  British  speech),  —  is 
not  heard  among  cultivated  people,  or  approved  by 
any  authority  on  either  side  of  the  water.  It  can  be 
described,  I  think,  so  that  Dean  Alford  himself,  and 
most  of  his  friends  and  neighbors,  —  certainly  the 
best  bred  and  educated  among  them,  —  would  recog- 


BRITISH   AND    "AMERICAN"   ENGLISH         49 

nize  it  in  the  description.  One  o£  the  persons  in 
question  asking,  for  instance,  for  a  glass  of  ale,  would 
pronounce  glass  with  the  broad  ah  sound  of  a,  to 
rhyme  with  ^k/S6',  and  ale  as  one  syllable  with  the  fii'st 
or  name  sound  of  a,  so  as  to  rhyme  with  male  and 
sail.  So  would  every  Yankee  of  like  culture.  But 
let  our  Very  Reverend  and  accomplished  censor  kindly 
take  a  well-bred  mouthful  of  finely  mashed  potato, 
and  after  chewing  it  a  decorous  while,  say,  just  as  he 
is  about  swallowing  it,  "  a  gloss  of  ayull ;  "  he  and 
the  friends  around  him  will  then  hear  a  striking  exam- 
ple of  what  his  "  American "  friend  called  English 
spoken  with  an  English  accent,  but  which  he  should 
have  called  English  with  a  South  British  accent. 
Now,  according  to  my  observation,  no  man  whom  the 
Dean  of  Canterbury  would  accept  as  a  speaker  of 
pure  English  says,  with  thick  utterance,  "  a  gloss  of 
ayull ;  "  and  yet  thousands  of  his  countrymen  do  speak 
thus.  But  with  social  refinement  and  mental  culture 
this  peculiarity  of  British  English  passes  gradually 
away,  until  among  the  best  bred  and  best  educated 
people  it  vanishes,  and  is  heard  no  more  than  it,  or 
a  nasal  twang,  is  heard  under  similar  circumstances 
here. 

One  trait  of  English  spoken  with  a  South  British 
accent  was  thus  whimsically  contrasted  with  the  pure 
English  accent  by  "  Punch,"  a  few  years  ago.  The 
value  of  the  illustration  is  not  affected  by  the  fact 
that  the  pronunciation  in  question  was  that  of  a  for- 
eign word.  The  true  pronunciation  of  the  name  of 
the  Italian  hero  of  the  day  was  mooted,  and  "  Fundi " 
decided  that  it  should  be,  — 

"  Garibaldi  wlien  duchesses  g'ave  him  a  6a7, 
~     Garibawldi  wbeu  up  goes  the  shout  of  the  people." 


50  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

The  distinction  thus  so  daintily  and  humorously 
drawn  is  one  that,  with  opportunity,  no  quick  and 
sensitive  ear  could  fail  to  notice.  The  strong  ten- 
dency of  the  uncultivated  South  Briton  is  to  give  to 
the  broad  a,  not  the  sound  of  ah  from  the  chest,  which 
is  heard  in  the  mouths  of  educated  persons  in  Old  and 
in  New  England,  but  a  thick  «?«,  formed  in  the  upper 
part  of  the  throat.  The  low  and  lower-middle  class 
London  man  calls  Garibaldi  Gawribawldi^  or,  rather, 
Gorribawldi.  But  if  the  Yankee  in  a  similar  con- 
dition of  life  deviates  from  the  true  Gahribahldi,  he 
will  make  the  vowel  shorter  and  thinner,  pronouncing 
it  as  in  "  palace  "  —  Garrjhaldi.  The  thick,  throaty 
pronunciation  of  the  broad  a  is  a  British  peculiarity  ; 
but  while  it  is  heard  in  the  mouths  of  so  many  persons 
that  it  divides  with  the  "  exhasperated  "  h  the  honor 
of  the  chief  distinction  of  English  spoken  with  a  Brit- 
ish accent,  it  is  as  little  prevalent  as  the  extinction  or 
superfluous  utterance  of  the  latter  letter  is  among  the 
best  speakers  in  England,  or  as  a  nasal  twang  aout 
for  "  out,"  and  tew  for  "  too  "  are  among  cultivated 
people  in  New  England.  Among  British  English- 
men few  but  those  who  to  a  good  education  unite  the 
very  highest  social  culture  are  perfectly  free  from 
both  these  traits  of  English  as  spoken  with  a  British 
accent. 

It  may  here  be  pertinently  remarked  that  the  pro- 
nunciation of  a  in  such  words  as  glass^  last ^  father^ 
and  pastor  is  a  test  of  high  culture.  The  tendency 
among  uncultivated  persons  is  to  give  a  either  the 
thick,  throaty  sound  of  aw  which  I  have  endeavored 
to  describe,  or,  oftenest,  to  give  it  the  thin,  flat 
sound  which  it  has  in  "an,"  "at,"  and  "anatomy." 
Next  to  that  tone  of  voice  which,  it  would  seem,  is 


BRITISH   AND    "AMERICAN"   ENGLISH         51 

not  to  be  acquired  by  any  striving  in  adult  years,  and 
which  indicates  breeding  rather  than  education,  the 
full,  free,  unconscious  utterance  of  the  broad  ah  sound 
of  a  is  the  surest  indication  in  speech  of  social  culture 
which  began  at  the  cradle. 


CHAPTER   IV 

STYLE 

Accuracy  of  expression  is  the  most  essential  ele- 
ment of  a  good  style ;  and  inaccurate  writing  is  gen- 
erally the  expression  of  inaccurate  thinking.  But 
when  men  have  shown  that  their  thought  is  important, 
it  is  ungi-acious  and  superfluous  to  hunt  down  their 
ifs  and  ands^  and  arraign  their  pronouns  and  preposi- 
tions. This  remark  would  apply  to  some  of  the  criti- 
cisms in  the  previous  chapter,  if  their  special  purpose 
were  left  out  of  consideration. 

Style,  according  to  my  observation,  cannot  be  taught, 
and  can  hardly  be  acquired.  Any  person  of  moder- 
ate ability  may,  by  study  and  practice,  learn  to  use  a 
language  according  to  its  grammar.  But  such  a  use 
of  language,  although  necessary  to  a  good  style,  has 
no  more  direct  relation  to  it  than  her  daily  dinner 
has  to  the  blush  of  a  blooming  beauty.  Without 
dinner,  no  bloom ;  without  grammar,  no  style.  The 
same  viand  which  one  young  woman,  digesting  it 
healthily  and  sleeping  upon  it  soundly,  is  able  to  pre- 
sent to  us  again  in  but  a  very  unattractive  form,  Glo- 
riana,  assimilating  it  not  more  perfectly  in  slumbers 
no  sounder,  transmutes  into  charms  that  make  her  a 
delight  to  the  eyes  of  every  beholder.  That  proceed- 
ing is  Gloriana's  physiological  style.  It  is  a  gift  to 
her.  Such  a  gift  is  style  in  the  use  of  language.  It 
is  mere  clearness  of  outline,  beauty  of  form  and  ex- 


STYLE  53 

pression,  and  has  no  relation  whatever  to  the  sound- 
ness or  the  value  of  the  thought  which  it  embodies,  or 
to  the  importance  or  the  interest  of  the  fact  which  it 
records.  Learned  men,  strong  and  subtle  thinkers, 
and  scholars  of  wide  and  critical  acquaintance  with 
literature,  are  often  unable  to  acquire  even  an  accept- 
ably good,  not  to  say  an  admirable,  style  ;  and,  on  the 
other  hand,  men  who  can  read  only  their  own  lan- 
guage, and  who  have  received  very  little  instruction 
even  in  that,  write  and  speak  in  a  style  that  wins  or 
commands  attention,  and  in  itself  gives  pleasure.  Of 
these  men  John  Bunyan  is,  perhaps,  the  most  marked 
example.  Better  English  there  could  hardly  be,  or  a 
style  more  admirable  for  every  excellence,  than  ap- 
pears throughout  the  writings  of  that  tinker.  No  per- 
son who  has  read  "  The  Pilgrim's  Progress  "  can  have 
forgotten  the  fight  of  Christian  with  Apollyon,  which, 
for  vividness  of  description  and  dramatic  interest,  puts 
to  shame  all  the  combats  between  knights  and  giants, 
and  men  and  dragons,  that  can  be  found  elsewhere  in 
romance  or  poetry ;  but  there  are  probably  many  who 
do  not  remember,  and  not  a  few  perhaps  who,  in  the 
very  enjoyment  of  it,  did  not  notice,  the  clearness,  the 
spirit,  the  strength,  and  the  simple  beauty  of  the  style 
in  which  that  passage  is  written.  For  examj)le,  take 
the  sentence  which  tells  of  the  beginning  of  the 
fight :  — 

"  Then  Apollyon  straddled  quite  over  the  whole  breadth  of 
the  way,  and  said,  I  am  void  of  fear  in  this  matter:  prepare  thy- 
self to  die ;  for  I  swear  by  my  infernal  Den  that  thou  shalt  go  no 
further:  here  will  I  spill  thy  soul." 

A  man  cannot  be  taught  to  write  like  that ;  nor  can 
he  by  any  study  learn  the  mystery  of  such  a  style. 
Style,  however,  although  it  cannot  be  taught,  is,  to 


64  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

a  certain  extent,  the  result  of  mental  training.  A 
man  who  would  write  well  without  training,  would 
write,  not  more  clearly  or  with  more  strength,  but 
with  more  elegance,  if  he  were  educated.  But  he  will 
profit  little  in  this  respect  by  the  study  of  rhetoric. 
It  is  general  culture  —  above  all,  it  is  the  constant 
submission  of  a  teachable,  apprehensive  mind  to  the 
influence  of  minds  of  the  highest  class,  in  daily  life 
and  in  books,  that  brings  out  upon  language  its  dain- 
tiest bloom  and  its  richest  fruitage.  So  in  the  making 
of  a  fine  singer :  after  the  voice  has  been  developed, 
and  the  rudiments  of  vocalization  have  been  learned, 
further  instruction  is  of  little  avail.  But  the  frequent 
hearing  of  the  best  music,  given  by  the  best  per- 
formers, the  living  in  an  atmosphere  of  art  and  litera- 
ture, will  develop  and  perfect  a  vocal  style  in  one  who 
has  the  gift  of  song  ;  and  for  any  other,  all  the  instruc- 
tion of  all  the  musical  professors  that  ever  came  out 
of  Italy  could  do  no  more  than  teach  an  avoidance  of 
positive  errors  in  musical  elocution.  But,  after  all,  the 
student's  style  may  profit  little  by  his  acquirements. 

Unconsciousness  is  one  of  the  most  important  con- 
ditions of  a  good  style  in  speaking  or  in  writing. 
There  are  persons  who  write  well  and  speak  ill ;  others 
who  wi'ite  ill  and  speak  well ;  and  a  few  who  are 
equally  excellent  as  writers  and  speakers.  As  both 
writing  and  speaking  are  the  expression  of  thought 
through  language,  this  capacity  for  the  one,  joined  to 
an  incapacity  for  the  other,  is  naturally  the  occasion 
of  remark,  and  has,  I  believe,  never  been  accounted 
for.  I  think  that  it  will  be  found  that  consciousness, 
which  generally  causes  more  or  less  embarrassment  of 
one  kind  or  another,  is  at  the  bottom  of  this  apparent 
incongruity.     The    man    who    writes    In  a  clear  and 


STYLE  55 

fluent  style,  but  who,  when  he  undertakes  to  speak, 
more  than  to  say  yes  or  no,  or  what  he  wouhl  like  for 
dinner,  hesitates,  and  utters  confusion,  does  so  because 
he  is  made  self-conscious  by  the  presence  of  others 
when  he  speaks,  but  gives  himself  unconsciously  to 
the  expression  of  his  thought  when  he  looks  only  upon 
the  paper  on  which  he  is  writing.  He  who  speaks 
with  ease  and  grace,  but  who  writes  in  a  crabbed,  in- 
volved style,  forgets  himself  when  he  looks  at  others, 
and  is  occupied  by  himself  when  he  is  alone.  His 
consciousness,  and  the  effort  that  he  makes,  on  the 
one  hand  to  throw  it  off,  and  on  the  other  to  meet 
its  demands  upon  him,  confuse  his  thoughts,  which 
throng,  and  jostle,  and  clash,  instead  of  moving  stead- 
ily onward  with  one  consent  together. 

Mere  unconsciousness  has  much  to  do  with  the 
charming  style  of  many  women's  letters.  Women's 
style,  when  they  write  books,  is  generally  bad  with  all 
the  varieties  of  badness ;  but  their  epistolary  style  is 
as  generally  excellent  in  all  the  ways  of  excellence. 
A  letter  written  by  a  bright,  cultivated  woman,  — 
and  she  need  not  be  a  highly  educated  or  a  much  in- 
structed woman,  but  merely  one  whose  intercourse  is 
with  cultivated  people,  —  and  written  merely  to  tell 
you  sometliing  that  interests  her  and  that  she  wishes 
you  to  know,  with  much  care  about  what  she  says, 
and  no  care  as  to  how  she  says  it,  will,  in  twelve  cases 
out  of  the  baker's  dozen,  be  not  only  irreproachably 
correct  in  expression  but  very  cliarming.  Some  liter- 
ary women,  though  few,  are  able  to  carry  this  clear, 
fluent,  idiomatic  English  style  into  their  books.  Mrs. 
Jameson,  Charlotte  Bronte,  and  perhaps  George  Eliot 
(Miss  Evans),  are  prominent  instances  in  point. 
Mrs.  TroUope's   book,    "  The  Domestic   Manners  of 


56  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

the  Americans,"  which  made  her  name  known,  and 
caused  it  to  be  detested,  unjustly,  in  this  country ,i  is 
written  in  this  delightful  style  —  easy-flowing  and 
clear,  like  a  beautiful  stream,  reflecting  from  its  placid 
surface  whatever  it  passes  by,  adding  in  the  reflection 
a  charm  to  the  image  which  is  not  in  the  object,  and 
distorting  only  when  it  is  dimpled  by  gayety  or  crisped 
by  a  flaw  of  satire  or  a  ripple  of  humor.  It  is  worth 
reading  only  for  its  style.  It  may  be  studied  to  ad- 
vantage and  emulated,  but  not  imitated ;  for  all  about 
it  that  is  worthy  of  emulation  is  inimitable.  Mr. 
Anthony  Trollope's  mastery  of  our  language  is  in- 
herited ;  but  he  has  not  come  into  possession  of  quite 
all  the  maternal  estate. 

For  at  least  a  hundred  years  the  highest  reputation 
for  purity  of  style  in  the  writing  of  English  j^rose  has 
been  Addison's.  Whether  or  not  he  deserves,  or  ever 
did  deserve,  the  eminence  upon  which  he  has  been 
placed,  he  certainly  is  one  of  the  most  elegant  and 
correct  writers  of  the  last  century.  Johnson's  formal 
and  didactic  laudation,  with  which  he  rounds  off  his 
criticism  of  this  author,  "  whoever  wishes  to  attain 
an  English  style,  familiar  but  not  coarse,  and  elegant 
but  not  ostentatious,  must  give  his  days  and  nights  to 
the  volumes  of  Addison,"  has  been  worth  a  great  deal 
to  the  booksellers,  and  has  stimulated  the  purchase  of 

^  Unjustly,  because  all  of  Mrs.  Trollope's  descriptions  were 
true  to  life,  and  were  evidently  taken  from  life.  Slie,  however, 
described  only  that  which  struck  her  as  peculiar;  and  her  ac- 
quaintance with  the  country  was  made  among  the  most  unculti- 
vated people,  and  chiefly  in  the  extreme  Southwest  and  West, 
thirty-five  years  ago;  which  was  much  like  going  into  "  the  bush  " 
of  Australia  ten  years  ago.  With  society  in  New  York,  Boston, 
and  Philadelphia  Mrs.  Trollope  was  charmed;  but  of  it  she, 
apparently  for  that  reason,  says  comparatively  little. 


STYLE  57 

countless  copies  of  "  The  Spectator,"  and,  let  us  hope, 
the  perusal  of  not  a  few.  But  in  the  face  of  so  weighty 
a  judgment,  let  us  test  Addison,  not  merely  by  com- 
parison with  other  writers,  but  by  the  well-estahlished 
rules  of  the  language,  and  by  those  laws  of  thought 
the  governing  power  of  which  is  admitted  in  every 
sound  and  educated  intellect,  and  to  which  every  mas- 
ter of  style  unconsciously  conforms.  Seeing  thus 
what  manner  of  man  he  is  who  has  been  held  up  to 
three  generations  as  the  bright  exemplar  of  purity, 
correctness,  and  grace  in  English  style,  we  may  intelli- 
gently determine  what  we  can  reasonably  expect  of 
the  great  mass  of  unpretending  writers  in  our  hard- 
working days. 

I  have  been  led  to  this  examination  by  recently 
reading,  for  the  first  time,  the  "  Essay  upon  the 
Pleasures  of  the  Imagination,"  which  runs  through  ten 
numbers  of  "  The  Spectator,"  ^  and  which  is  one  of 
Addison's  most  elaborate  performances.  Bishop  Hurd 
says  of  it,  in  his  edition  of  this  author's  writings,  that 
it  is  "  by  far  the  most  masterly  of  all  Mr.  Addison's 
critical  works,"  and  that  "  the  style  is  finished  with 
so  much  care  as  to  merit  the  best  attention  of  the 
reader." 

The  first  number  of  the  Essay  appeared  on  Satur- 
day, June  21,  1712,  with  a  motto  from  Lucretius, 
which  intimates  that  Mr.  Addison  broke  his  own 
path  across  a  trackless  country  to  drink  from  an 
untasted  spring.'-^  This  should  excuse  some  deviation 
from  the  line  of  our  now  well-beaten  road  of  criti- 

1  Nos.  411  to  421. 

^  "  Avia  Piericlum  peragere  loca,  nullius  ante 

Trita  solo  :  jnvat  iutegros  accedere  fouteis, 

Atque  haurire." 


58  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

cism ;  but  there  are  other  errors  for  which  It  is  no 
apology.  The  first  sentence  tells  us  that  "  our  sight 
is  the  most  perfect  and  delightful  of  all  our  senses." 
A  careless  use  of  language,  to  begin  with ;  for  sight 
is  not  more  perfect  than  any  other  sense.  Perfect 
hearing  is  just  as  perfect  as  perfect  sight ;  that  is,  it 
is  simply  perfect.  But  passing  by  this  as  a  venial 
error,  we  find  the  third  sentence  beginning  thus :  — 

"  The  sense  of  feeling  can  indeed  give  us  a  notion  of  exten- 
sion, shape,  and  all  other  ideas  that  enter  at  the  eye,  except 
colours." 

Now,  we  may  be  sure  that  Addison  did  not  mean 
to  say  what  he  does  say  —  that  the  sense  of  feeling 
can  give  us  the  notion  of  ideas,  and  that  colors  are 
an  idea.  His  meaning  we  may  be  equally  sure  was 
this :  The  sense  of  feeling  can  indeed  give  us  a  notion 
of  extension  and  of  shape,  and  every  other  idea  that 
can  enter  at  the  eye,  except  that  of  color.  A  little 
farther  on  we  find  tliis  explanation  of  the  subject  of 
his  Essay :  — 

"  —  so  that  by  the  pleasures  of  imagination  or  of  fancy 
(which  I  shall  use  promiscuously),  I  here  mean  such  as  arise 
from  visible  objects." 

Here  the  strange  confounding  of  imagination  with 
fancy  —  faculties  which  had  been  clearly  distin- 
guished a  hundred  years  before  the  time  of  Addison 
—  first  attracts  attention.  But  not  insisting  upon 
that  mistake,  let  us  pass  on  to  learn  immediately  that 
he  means  to  use  the  pleasures  of  those  faculties  pro- 
miscuously. But  he  manifestly  intended  to  say  that 
he  would  use  the  words  imagination  and  fancy  pro- 
miscuously. The  confusion  in  his  sentence  is  pro- 
duced by  his  first  mentioning  the  facultipis  and  then 


STYLE  59 

using  "  which  "  to  refer,  not  to  the  faculties,  but  to 
the  words  which  are  their  names.     Again  he  says,  — 

"  —  but  we  have  the  power  of  retaining,  altering,  and  com- 
pounding those  images  which  we  have  once  received  into  all  the 
varieties  of  picture  and  vision  that  are  most  agreeable  to  the 
imagination." 

Did  Addison  mean  that  we  have  the  power  of 
"  retaining  images  into  "  all  the  varieties  of  picture, 
and  so  forth  ?  Certainly  not ;  although  that  is  what 
he  says.  Here  again  is  confusion  of  thought.  lie 
groups  together  and  connects  by  a  conjunction  three 
verbs,  — 7'etain^  alter,  and  com2)Ound,  —  only  two  of 
which  can  be  united  to  the  same  preposition.  This 
fault  is  often  committed  by  writers  who  do  not  think 
clearly,  or  who  will  not  take  the  trouble  to  perfect 
and  balance  their  sentences  by  repeating  a  word  or 
two,  and  by  looking  after  the  fitness  of  their  particles. 
What  Addison  meant  to  say  was,  —  but  we  have  the 
power  of  retaining  those  images  ivhich  we  have  once 
received,  and  of  altering  and  compounding  them  into 
all  the  varieties  of  jjicture,  and  so  forth.  A  few  lines 
below  we  find  this  sentence  :  — 

"  There  are  few  words  in  the  English  language  which  are 
employed  in  a  more  loose  and  uncircumscribed  sense  than  those 
of  the  fancy  and  imagination." 

The  confusion  here  is  great  and  of  a  very  vulgar 
kind.  It  is  produced  by  the  superfluous  words 
"those  of  the."  Addison  meant  to  say  —  in  a  more 
loose  and  uncircumscribed  sense,  not  than  the  words 
of  the  fancy  and  imagination,  but  than  fancy  and 
imagination.  In  the  same  paragraph  which  fur- 
nishes the  foregoing  example,  the  writer  says,  "  I 
divide  these  pleasures  in  two  kinds."     It  is  English 


60  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

to  say,  I  divide  these  pleasures  into  two  kinds.     The 
next  paragraph  opens  thus  :  — 

"  The  pleasures  of  the  imagination,  taken  in  their  full  extent, 
are  not  so  gross  as  those  of  sense,  nor  so  refined  as  those  of  the 
understanding." 

Here  again  is  confusion  produced  by  a  careless 
use  of  language  —  careless  even  to  blundering.  Ad- 
dison did  not  mean  to  speak  of  taking  jJ^^asureSf 
either  of  the  imagination,  the  sense,  or  the  under- 
standing. If  he  had  written  —  The  pleasures  of 
imagination,  regarded,  or  considered,  in  their  full 
extent,  are  not  so  gross,  and  so  forth  —  he  would 
have  uttered  what  the  whole  context  shows  to  have 
been  his  thought.  The  next  paragraph  makes  the 
following  assertions  in  regard  to  what  is  called  a  man 
"  of  polite  imagination  :  "  — 

"  He  meets  with  a  secret  refreshment  in  a  description,  and 
often  feels  a  greater  satisfaction  in  the  prospect  of  fields  and 
meadows  than  another  does  in  the  possession.  It  gives  him, 
indeed,  a  kind  of  property  in  everything  he  sees,  and  makes  the 
most  rude  and  uncultivated  parts  of  Nature  administer  to  his 
pleasures  ;  so  that  he  looks  upon  the  world,  as  it  were,  in 
another  light,  and  discovers  in  it  a  multitude  of  charms  that 
conceal  themselves  from  the  generality  of  mankind." 

The  first  of  these  sentences  is  imperfect.  We 
may  be  sure  that  the  writer  means  that  his  man  of 
polite  imagination  feels  a  greater  satisfaction  in  the 
prospei'-t  of  fields  and  meadows  than  another  does 
in  the  possession  q/*  them.  But  he  does  not  say  so. 
Nor  b^  any  rule  or  usage  of  the  English  language 
are  th*»  preposition  and  j)ronoun  implied  or  under- 
stood ;  for  the  sentence  might  just  as  well  end  — 
"than  another  does  in  the  possession  o/*  great 
ricTieif  '     And   what  does   the   author  mean   by   say- 


STYLE  61 

ing  that  his  politely  imaginative  man  looks  upon 
the  world  "  in  another  light "  ?  Another  than  what  ? 
No  other  is  mentioned  or  implied.  The  writer  was 
referring  to  an  idea  which  he  had  in  mind,  but  which 
he  had  not  expressed  ;  and  we  can  only  guess  that  he 
meant,  another  light  than  that  in  which  the  world 
is  regarded  by  men  of  impolite  imagination.  The 
same  sort  of  confusion  appears  in  the  first  sentence  of 
the  very  next  paragraph  :  — 

"  There  are,  indeed,  but  very  few  who  know  how  to  be  idle 
and  innocent,  or  have  a  relish  of  pleasures  that  are  not  criminal : 
every  diversion  they  take  is  at  the  expense  of  some  one  virtue 
or  another." 

Here,  in  the  first  place,  by  neglecting  to  repeat 
wlio^  Addison  says  that  there  are  very  few  men  who 
know  how  to  have  a  relish  of  pleasures  that  are  not 
criminal ;  whereas,  he  manifestly  meant  to  say  that 
there  are  very  few  who  know  how  to  be  idle  and 
innocent,  or  who  have  a  relish  of  pleasures  that  are 
not  criminal.  But  the  chief  blunder  of  the  sentence 
is  in  its  next  clause.  Who  are  "  they  "  who  are  said 
to  take  every  diversion  at  the  expense  of  some  vir- 
tue ?  According  to  the  writer's  purpose,  "  they  "  has 
really  no  antecedent.  Its  antecedent,  as  the  sentence 
stands,  is,  "  very  few  who  know  how  to  be  idle  and 
innocent ; "  but  these,  the  writer  plainly  means  to 
say,  are  they  who  do  not  take  their  diversion  at  the 
expense  of  some  virtue.  By  "  they  "  Addison  meant 
the  many  from  whom  he  had  in  his  own  mind  sep- 
arated the  very  few  of  whom  only  he  spoke ;  and  lie 
thus  involved  himself  and  his  readers  in  a  confusion 
which  is  irremediable  without  a  recasting  of  his  sen- 
tence. All  these  marked  faults  of  style  —  faults 
which  are  not  examples  of  mere  inelegance,  but  of 


62  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

positively  bad  English  and  confused  thought  —  occur 
within  three  duodecimo  pages.  It  might  possibly  be 
suggested  that  perhaps  Addison  wrote  this  particular 
number  of  "  The  Spectator  "  when  the  usual  mellow- 
ness of  his  style  had  been  spirited  into  his  brain. ^ 
But,  on  the  contrary,  similar  examples  of  slovenly 
writing  may  be  found  all  through  those  charming 
"  Spectators  "  to  which  Johnson  refers  us  as  models 
of  English  style.  Let  us  see.  Here  is  the  third  sen- 
tence in  "  Spectator "  405,  a  musical  criticism  apro- 
pos of  Signer  Nicolini's  singing ;  for  Addison,  as 
well  as  Guizot,  wrote  art  criticisms  for  the  daily 
press. 

"  I  could  heartily  wish  there  was  the  same  application  and 
endeavours  to  cultivate  and  improve  our  chureh-musick  as  have 
been  lately  bestowed  on  that  of  the  stage." 

It  would  not  be  easy  to  construct  an  intelligible 
sentence,  without  burlesque,  that  would  be  more 
blundering  than  this  one  is.  To  begin  :  "  I  could 
heartily  wish,"  is  nonsense.  A  man  wishes,  or  he 
does  not  wish.  But  to  pass  by  this  feeble  and  affected 
phrase,  which  is  too  commonly  used,  the  writer  wishes 
that  there  "  was  the  same  application  and  endeavors," 
etc.,  "  as  have  been,"  etc.  He  says  neither  "  was  "  and 
"  has  been,"  nor  "  were  "  and  "  have  been."  He  should 
have  used  the  plural  form  of  each  verb,  of  course  ;  but 
he  contrived  to  get  into  his  sentence  all  the  errors  of 

^  Bishop  Hurd  says  of  this  Essay,  "Some  inaccuracies  of 
expression  have,  however,  escaped  the  elegant  writer  ;  and 
these,  as  we  go  along,  shall  be  pointed  out."  But  it  is  impor- 
tant to  our  purpose  to  mention  that  not  one  of  the  inaccurate 
and  confused  passages  noticed  above  is  pointed  out  by  the  ed- 
itor, who  calls  attention  to  but  one  or  two  trifling  lapses  in  mere 
elegance  of  expression. 


STYLE  63 

which  It  was  capable.  Besides,  the  use  of  the  pronoun 
*'  that "  is  extremely  awkward,  even  if,  indeed,  it  be 
correct.  For,  as  the  sentence  stands,  "  that  "  refers  to 
"  church  music,"  and  the  writer  really  speaks  of  the  en- 
deavors which  have  been  bestowed  "  on  the  church  music 
of  the  stage."  He  should  have  written  either  —  church 
music  and  stage  music,  or  music  of  the  church  and 
that  of  the  stage  ;  of  which  constructions  the  latter  is 
the  better.  The  sentence  may,  therefore,  be  correctly 
written  (it  cannot  be  made  graceful  or  elegant)  thus : 
I  heartily  wish  that  there  were  the  same  application 
and  endeavors  to  cultivate  and  improve  the  music  of 
the  church  as  have  lately  been  bestowed  on  that  of 
the  stage. 

In  "  Spectator "  No.  381  is  the  following  sen- 
tence :  — 

"  The  tossing  of  a  tempest  does  not  discompose  him,  which  he 
is  sure  will  bring  him  to  a  joyful  harbour." 

The  use  of  which  in  this  sentence  is  like  that  which 
Mr.  Dickens  has  so  humorously  caricatured  in  the 
speech  of  Mrs.  Gamp  ;  indeed,  the  sentence  is  almost 
in  her  style,  or  that  of  her  invisible  gossip,  Mrs.  Har- 
ris. Addison  meant  to  say  —  The  tossing  of  a  tem- 
pest does  not  discompose  him  who  is  sure  that  it  will 
bring  him  to  a  joyful  harbor. 

In  this  sentence,  from  "  Spectator  "  No.  21,  venture 
is  used  for  allow  :  — 

"  —  as  a  man  would  be  well  enough  pleased  to  buy  silks  of 
cue  whom  he  would  not  venture  to  feel  his  pulse." 

And  what  shall  be  said  of  the  correctness  of  a 
writer  who  couples  the  separative  each  with  the  plural 
are,  as  Addison  does  in  the  following  passage  from 
»  Spectator  "  No.  21  ? 


64  WORDS   AND  THEIR   USES 

"  When  I  consider  how  each  of  these  professions  are  crowded 
with  multitudes  that  seek  their  livelihoods  in  them,"  etc. 

That  slovenly  writing  is  the  birth-form  of  careless 
thinking,  could  hardly  be  more  clearly  shown  than 
by  the  following  example,  from  "  Spectator "  No. 
Ill:  — 

"  That  cherubim  which  now  appears  as  a  god  to  a  human  soul 
knows  very  well  that  the  period  will  come  above  in  eternity, 
when  the  human  soul  shall  be  as  perfect  as  he  himself  now  is  ; 
nay,  when  she  shall  look  down  upon  that  degree  of  perfection  as 
much  as  she  now  falls  short  of  it." 

If  Addison  did  not  know  that  cherubim  was  the 
plural  of  cherub,  and  that  he  should  have  used  the 
latter  word,  there  is  at  least  no  excuse  for  the  last 
clause  of  the  sentence,  which  is  chaotic.  He  would 
have  expressed  his  meaning  if  he  had  written  —  Nay, 
when  she  shall  look  down  upon  that  degree  of  perfec- 
tion as  much  as  she  now  looks  up  to  it ;  or,  better  — 
Nay,  when  she  shall  find  her&elf  as  much  above  that 
degree  of  perfection  as  she  now  falls  short  of  it. 

With  two  more  examples  I  must  finish  this  array. 
Speaking  of  Sir  Andrew  Freeport,  Addison  says,  — ■ 

"  —  but  in  the  temper  of  mind  he  was  then,  he  termed  them 
mercies,  favours  of  Providence,  and  blessings  upon  honest  indus- 
try." —  Spectator,  No.  549. 

Explaining  a  pasquinade,  he  writes,  — 

"  This  was  a  reflection  upon  the  Pope's  sister,  who,  before  the 
promotion  of  her  brother,  was  in  those  circumstances  that  Pas- 
quin  represented  her."  —  Spectator,  No.  23. 

It  would  be  superfluous  either  to  point  out  or  to 
correct  the  gross  errors  in  these  passages  —  errors 
which  are  worthy  of  notice  as  examples  of  blunders 
peculiarly  British  in  character.  Errors  of  this  kind 
are  not  unfrequently  met  with  in  the  writing  or  the 


STYLE  on 

speech  of  the  middling  folk  among  our  British  cousins 
at  the  present  day ;  but  on  this  side  of  the  water  they 
seldom  occur,  if  ever.  Our  faults  are  of  another  sort ; 
and  they  appear  in  the  casual  writings  of  inferior 
journalists,  who  produce  at  night  what  must  be  printed 
before  morning,  or  in  those  of  authors  who  attain  not 
even  to  local  reputation.  It  would  be  difficult  to 
match  with  examples  from  American  writers  of  even 
moderate  distinction  such  sentences  as  the  following, 
which  appear  in  Brougham's  appreciation  of  Talley- 
rand :  — 

"  Among  the  eminent  men  who  figured  in  the  eventful  history 
of  the  French  revolution  was  M.  Talleyrand  ;  and  whether  in 
that  scene,  or  in  any  portion  of  modern  annals,  we  shall  in  vain 
look  for  one  who  represents  a  more  interesting  subject  of 
history." 

What  a  muddle  of  thoughts  and  words  is  here  ! 
Talleyrand  figured  in  the  French  revolution,  not  in 
the  history  of  that  event.  It  may  be  correctly  said 
of  him  that  he  figures  in  the  history  of  the  French 
revolution  ;  but  whether  this  is  what  Brougham  meant 
to  say,  the  latter  clause  of  the  sentence  makes  it  im- 
possible to  discover.  For  there  "  5ce?ie,"  which  refers 
to  the  event  itself,  and  "  annals,^^  which  refers  to  the 
record  of  events,  are  confounded ;  and  we  are  finally 
told  that  a  man  who  figured  in  an  eventful  history 
represents  an  interesting  subject  of  history  !  Within 
a  few  lines  of  this  sentence  we  have  the  one  here 
following :  — 

"  He  sided  with  the  revolution,  and  continued  to  act  with 
them,  joining  those  patriotic  members  of  the  clerical  body  who 
gave  up  their  revenues  to  the  demand  of  the  country,  and  sac- 
rificed their  exclusive  privileges  to  the  rights  of  the  commu- 
nity." 


6G  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

With  whom  did  Talleyrand  continue  to  act  ?  What 
is  the  antecedent  of  "  them  "  F  It  has  none.  It  refers 
to  what  is  not  expressed,  and,  except  in  the  mind  of 
the  writer,  not  understood  —  the  revolutionary  clergy ; 
and  I  have  quoted  the  whole  of  the  sentence,  that  this 
might  appear  from  its  second  clause.  And  yet  Henry 
Brougham  was  one  of  the  men  who  achieved  the  splen- 
did early  reputation  of  the  "  Edinburgh  Review." 

But  to  what  conclusion  are  we  tending?  If  not 
only  Brougham's  but  Addison's  sentences  thus  break 
down  under  such  criticism  as  we  apply  to  the  exer- 
cises of  a  schoolboy,  —  Addison,  of  whose  style  we 
are  told  by  Johnson,  in  Johnsonian  jahrase,  that  it  is 
"  pure  without  scrupulosity  and  exact  without  appar- 
ent elaboration,"  —  to  whom  shall  we  look  as  a  model 
writer  of  prose,  who  can  be  our  standard  and  author- 
ity as  to  a  pure  English  style  ?  Clearly  not  to  the 
principal  writer  of  "  The  Spectator."  For,  although 
he  may  liave  been  without  either  scrupulosity  or  ela- 
boration, he  was  also  quite  as  plainly  often  without 
both  purity  and  exactness.  Such  faults  of  style  as 
those  which  are  above  pointed  out  in  the  writings  of 
Addison  ai*e  not  to  be  found,  I  believe,  in  Shake- 
speare's prose,  in  Bacon's,  or  in  Milton's  ;  but  they  do 
appear  in  Dryden's.  They  will  be  looked  for  in  vain, 
if  I  may  trust  my  memory,  in  the  works  of  Goldsmith, 
Johnson,  Hume,  Gibbon,  Hallam,  Jeffrey,  Macaulay, 
Irving,  Prescott,  Ruskin,  Motley,  and  Hawthorne. 
Addison,  appearing  at  a  time  when  English  literature 
was  at  a  very  low  ebb,  made  an  impression  which  his 
writings  would  not  now  produce,  and  won  a  reputa- 
tion which  was  then  his  due,  but  which  has  long  sur- 
vived his  comparative  excellence.  Charmed  by  the 
gentle  flow  of  his  thought,  —  which,  neither  deep  nor 


STYLE  67 

strong,  neither  subtle  nor  struggling-  with  the  obsta- 
cles of  argument,  might  well  flow  easily,  —  by  his 
lambent  humor,  his  ])layful  fancy  (he  was  very  slen- 
derly endowed  with  imagination),  and  the  healthy 
tone  of  his  mind,  the  writers  of  his  own  generation 
and  those  of  the  succeeding  half  century  placed  him 
upon  a  pedestal,  in  his  right  to  which  there  has  since 
been  almost  unquestioning  acquiescence.  lie  cer- 
tainly did  much  for  English  literature,  and  more  for 
English  morals  and  manners,  which,  in  his  day,  were 
sadly  in  need  of  elevation  and  refinement.  But,  as  a 
writer  of  English,  he  is  not  to  be  compared,  except 
with  great  peril  to  his  reputation,  to  at  least  a  score 
of  men  who  have  flourished  in  the  present  century, 
and  some  of  whom  are  now  living.  And  from  this 
slight  examination  of  the  writings  of  him  whom  the 
world  has  for  so  long  accepted  as  the  acknowledged 
master  of  English  prose,  and  who  attained  his  emi- 
nence more  by  the  beauty  of  his  style  than  the  value 
of  the  thought  of  which  it  was  the  vehicle,  we  may 
learn  the  true  worth  and  place  of  such  criticisms  as 
those  which  have  preceded  these  remarks.  Their 
value  is  in  their  fitness  for  mental  discipline.  Their 
place  is  the  class-room. 


CHAPTER  V 

MISUSED   WORDS 

The  rioflit  use  of  words  is  not  a  matter  to  be  left 
to  pedants  and  pedagogues.  It  belongs  to  the  daily 
life  of  every  man.  The  misuse  of  words  confuses 
ideas,  and  impairs  the  value  of  language  as  a  medium 
of  communication.  Hence  loss  of  time,  of  money,  and 
sore  trial  of  patience.  It  is  significant  that  we  call 
a  quarrel  a  misunderstanding.  How  many  lawsuits 
have  ruined  both  plaintiff  and  defendant,  how  many 
business  connections  have  been  severed,  how  many 
friendships  broken,  because  two  men  gave  to  one  word 
different  meanings  !  The  power  of  language  to  con- 
vey one  man's  thoughts  and  purposes  to  another,  is  in 
direct  proportion  to  a  common  consent  as  to  the 
meaning  of  words.  The  moment  divergence  begins, 
the  value  of  language  is  impaired  ;  and  it  is  impaired 
just  in  proportion  to  the  divergence,  or  to  the  uncer- 
tainty of  consent.  It  has  been  told,  as  evidence  of 
the  richness  of  certain  Eastern  languages,  that  they 
have  one  thousand  words,  more  or  less,  for  the  sword, 
and  at  least  one  hundred  for  the  horse.  But  this,  un- 
less the  people  who  use  these  languages  have  a  thou- 
sand kind  of  swords  and  a  hundred  kinds  of  horses,  is 
no  proof  of  wealth  in  that  which  makes  the  real  worth 
of  language.  A  highly  civilized"""and  cultivated  peo- 
ple having  a  language  adequate  to  their  wants  will  be 


MISUSED  WORDS  69 

rich  in  words,  because  they  will  need  names  for  many 
thoughts,  and  many  acts,  and  many  things.  Parsi- 
mony in  this  respect  is  a  sign,  not  of  prudence,  hut  of 
poverty.  Juliana,  passing  her  honeymoon  in  the  cot- 
tage to  which  her  ducal  bridegroom  leads  her,  flouts 
his  assurance  that  the  furniture  is  useful,  with  the  re- 
ply, conveying  a  sneer  at  his  supjjosed  jjoverty,  "  Ex- 
ceeding useful ;  there's  not  a  piece  on 't  but  serves 
twenty  purposes,"  So,  when  we  find  in  a  language 
one  word  serving  many  needs,  we  may  be  sure  that 
that  language  is  the  mental  furniture  of  an  intellectu- 
ally rude  and  poverty-stricken  people.  The  Feejee 
islanders  ate  usually  pig,  but  they  much  preferred 
man,  both  for  his  flavor  and  his  rarity ;  and  as  we  call 
pig  prepared  for  table  pork,  and  deer  in  a  like  condi- 
tion venison,  so  those  poor  people  called  their  loin  or 
ham  "  short  pig,"  and  their  daintier  human  haunch  or 
saddle  "  long  pig."  ArchbishoiJ  Trench,  assuming 
that  there  was  in  the  latter  name  an  attempt  at  a 
humorous  concealment  of  the  nature  of  the  viand  to 
which  it  was  applied,  finds  in  this  attempt  evidence  of 
a  consciousness  of  the  revolting  character  of  cannibal- 
ism. But  this  seems  to  be  one  of  those  pieces  of  fan- 
ciful and  over-subtle  moral  reflection  which,  coming 
gracefully  enough  from  a  clergyman,  have  added  to 
the  jjopularity  of  Trench's  books,  although  hardly  to 
their  real  value.  The  poor  Feejeeans  called  all  meat 
pig,  distinguishing  two  sorts  only  by  the  form  of  the 
animal  from  which  it  was  taken,  merely  because  of  the 
rude  and  embryotic  condition  of  their  language,  just 
as  a  little  child  calls  all  fur  and  velvet  "  jjussy-cat." 
The  child  knows  as  well  as  its  mother  that  her  muff 
or  her  gown  has  not  four  legs,  claws,  whiskers,  and  a 
tail ;  and  it  has  no  purpose  of  concealing  that  know- 


70  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

ledge.  But  Its  poverty  o£  language  enables  it  to  speak 
of  the  muff  and  the  velvet  gown  only  by  a  name  which 
expresses  (to  the  child)  the  quality  which  the  muff, 
the  gown,  and  the  animal  have  in  common. 

A  neglect  to  preserve  any  well-drawn  distinction 
in  words  between  thoughts  or  things  is,  just  so  far, 
a  return  toward  barbarism  in  language.  In  the  Lon- 
don "  Times's  "  report  of  the  revolting  scene  in  front 
cf  the  gallows  on  which  Muller  (he  who  killed  a  fel- 
low-passenger in  a  railway  carriage)  was  hanged,  it 
was  said  that  many  of  the  spectators,  knowing  that  if 
they  would  get  a  good  place  they  must  wait  a  long 
while  to  see  the  show,  came  provided  with  "jars  of 
beer."  Now,  we  may  be  sure  that  there  was  not  a  jar 
in  all  that  crowd.  A  jar,  which  is  a  wide-mouthed 
earthen  vessel  without  a  handle,  would  be  a  very  un- 
suitable and  cumbrous  vessel  on  such  an  occasion  and 
in  such  a  place  ;  and  besides,  beer  is  neither  kept  in 
jars,  nor  drunk  from  them.  The  "  Times's  "  reporter, 
who  is  said  to  have  been,  on  this  occasion,  a  man  of 
letters  of  some  reputation,  meant,  doubtless,  tankards, 
pots,  jugs,  or  pitchers.  Of  household  vessels  for  con- 
taining fluids  we  have  in  English  good  store  of  names 
nicely  distinctive  of  various  forms  and  uses  ;  and  there 
seems  to  be  a  chance  that  we  shall  lose  some  of  them, 
through  either  the  ignorance  or  the  indolence  of  writ- 
ers and  speakers  like  the  "  Times's  "  reporter.  It  is 
not  long  since  every  lady  in  the  land  had,  as  Gremio 
said  that  Bianca  should  have,  "  basins  and  ewers  to  lave 
her  dainty  hands,"  although  not  of  gold,  as  that  glib- 
tongued  lover  promised.  But  now  we  are  all,  with 
few  exceptions,  content  to  use  a  bowl  and  pitcher. 
The  things  are  the  same,  only  they  are  handsomer-, 
but  we  have,  many  of  us  at  least,  given  up  the  dis- 


MISUSED  WORDS  71 

tinction  between  bowl  and  basin,  and  common  pitcher 
and  ewer,  and  so  far  we  have  retrograded  in  civility. 
Some  British  writers  and  speakers  say  "  a  basin  of 
bread  and  milk."  We  may  be  sure  they  mean  a 
bowl,  for  a  basin  is  an  uncomfortable  vessel  to  eat 
from.  But  if  they  mean  a  bowl,  they  should  say  a 
bowl ;  for  although  we  have  dropped  po7'ringcr  except 
in  poetry  (yet  there  are  men  living  who,  in  their  child- 
hood, have  talked  of  porringers  as  well  as  eaten  out 
of  them),  we  may  as  well  try  to  preserve  some  dis- 
tinction between  the  names  of  our  domestic  utensils, 
unless,  emulating  the  simplicity  of  the  Feejeeans  in 
their  short  pig  and  long  pig,  we  call  them  all,  for  ex- 
amjjle,  cup,  and  say  short  cup,  long  cup,  high  cup,  low 
cup,  big  cup,  little  cup,  deep  cup,  shallow  cup. 

Our  British  kinsmen  have,  during  the  last  fifty  or 
perhaps  hundred  years,  fallen  into  the  use  of  a  pecu- 
liar misnomer  in  this  respect.  They,  without  excep- 
tion, I  believe,  talk  of  the  water  jug  and  the  milk  jug, 
meaning  the  vessels  in  which  water  and  milk  are 
served  at  the  table.  Now,  those  vessels  are  not  jugs, 
but  pitchers.  A  jug  is  a  vessel  having  a  small  mouth, 
a  swelling  belly,  and  a  small  ear  or  handle  near  the 
mouth ;  and  this,  we  know,  is  never  used  at  table  ;  a 
pitcher  is  a  vessel  with  a  wide  mouth,  a  protruding 
lip,  and  a  large  ear ;  and  this-  we  know  that  they,  as 
well  as  we,  do  use  at  table  for  milk  and  for  water. 
The  thing  has  had  the  name  for  centuries.  Hence  the 
old  saying  that  little  pitchers  (not  little  jugs)  have 
great  ears.  Little  pitchers,  from  the  physical  neces- 
sity of  their  shape  and  proportion,  must  have  great 
ears ;  little  jugs  may  have  ears  in  proportion  to  their 
size.  This  word,  by  the  by,  is  the  best  test,  if  indeed 
it  is  not  the  only  sure  test,  of  the  nationality  of  a  cul 


72  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

tivated  man  of  English  blood,  —  for  as  to  the  uncul- 
tivated, no  nice  test  is  needed.  Been  and  hin^  sick 
and  ill,  drive  and  ride,  a  quarter  to  twelve  and  a 
quarter  o/"  twelve  o'clock,  V2i\\.way  station  and  vdMroad 
defot,  even  pitch  and  inflection  of  voice,  may  fail  to 
mark  the  distinction ;  but  if  a  man  asks  for  the  milk 
jug,  be  sure  that  he  is  British  bred ;  if  for  the  milk 
pitcher,  be  equally  sure  that  he  is  American. ^  But 
perhaps  some  people  are  quite  indifferent  whether  or 
no  it  is  said  that  they  sip  their  coffee,  out  of  a  jar, 
drink  their  beer  from  a  vase,  and  put  their  flowers 
into  a  jug.  Such  readers  will  not  be  at  all  interested 
in  the  following  remarks  upon  the  misuse  of  certain 
English  words.  It  is  not  my  purpose  in  these  re- 
marks to  notice  slang,  but  I  shall  notice  cant.  Be- 
tween the  two,  although  they  are  often  confounded, 
there  is  a  clear  distinction. 

Slang  is  a  vocabulary  of  genuine  words  or  unmean« 
ing  jargon,  used  always  with  an  arbitrary  and  con- 
ventional signification,  and  generally  with  humorous 
intent.  It  is  mostly  coarse,  low,  and  foolish,  although 
in  some  cases,  owing  to  circumstances  of  the  time,  it 
is  racy,  pungent,  and  pregnant  of  meaning.     Cant  is 

^  As  to  the  use  of  ill  for  sick,  aud  drive  for  ride,  see  pages  175, 
179.  Since  this  passage  was  written,  I  have  had  a  remarkable 
confirmation  of  its  truth  in  the  language  of  a  lady  born  and  bred 
in  London,  who  spoke,  with  entire  unconsciousness  of  her  excel- 
lence, the  most  beautiful  English  I  ever  heard  even  among  her 
countrywomen,  however  high  their  breeding  or  their  culture  — 
beautiful  in  idiom,  in  pronunciation,  in  enunciation,  and  in  qual- 
ity and  inflection  of  voice.  She,  being  entirely  ignorant  of  any 
question  upon  these  points,  and  thovightless  about  her  speech, 
said,  " I  have  been  sick  with  a  cold  ; "  "I  have  enjoyed  the 
ride"  (in  a  carriage);  but  even  she  asked  the  servant  to  bring 
"  a  jug  of  water." 


MISUSED   WORDS  73 

a  phraseology  composed  o£  genuine  words  soberly 
used  by  some  sect,  profession,  or  sort  of  men,  in  one 
legitimate  sense,  which  they  adopt  to  the  exclusion  of 
others  as  having  peculiar  virtue,  and  which  thereby 
becomes  peculiar  to  themselves.  Cant  is  more  or  less 
enduring,  its  use  continuing,  with  no  variation  of 
meaning,  through  generations.  Slang  is  very  eva- 
nescent. It  generally  passes  out  of  use  and  out  of 
mind  in  the  course  of  a  few  years,  and  often  m  a  few 
months. 

Abortive.  —  A  ridiculous  perversion  of  this  word 
is  creeping  into  use  through  the  newspapers.  For 
example,  I  read  in  one,  of  large  circulation  and  high 
position,  that  "  a  young  Spaniard  yesterday  abortively 
seized  two  pieces  of  alpaca."  That  is  abortive  which 
is  untimely  in  its  birth,  which  has  not  been  borne  its 
full  time ;  and,  by  figure  of  speech,  anything  is  abor- 
tive which  is  brought  out  before  it  is  well  matured. 
A  plan  may  be  abortive,  but  an  act  cannot.  It  would 
be  a  great  waste  of  time  to  notice  such  ludicrous  writ- 
ing as  that  above  quoted,  were  there  not  among  jour- 
nalists, and  generally  among  that  vast  multitude  who 
think  it  fine  to  use  a  word  which  they  do  not  quite 
understand,  a  tendency  to  the  use  of  abortion  to  mean 
failure  in  all  its  kinds  and  all  its  stages. 

Adopt.  —  A  very  strange  perversion  of  this  word 
from  its  true  meaning  prevails  among  some  unlettered 
folk,  generally  of  Irish  birth,  whose  misuse  of  it  is 
daily  seen  in  the  personal  advertisements  in  the  New 
York  "Herald."  Thus,  "Wanted  to  Adopt  —  A 
beautiful  and  healthy  female  infant."  The  adver- 
tisers mean  that  they  wish  to  have  the  children  men- 
tioned in  their  advertisements  adopted.  In  speaking 
of  the  transaction,  their  phrase  is  that  the  child  is 


74  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

"adopted  out,"  or  that  such  and  such  a  woman 
"  adopted  out  "  her  child.  The  perversion,  it  may  be 
said  inversion,  of  this  word,  is  worth  noticing  because 
upon  the  misuse  of  adoi^t  in  these  advertisements, 
travellers  and  foreign  writers  have  founded  an  argu- 
ment against  the  reproductive  power  of  the  European 
races  in  this  country.  From  the  many  advertisements 
*'  Wanted  to  Adopt,"  it  has  been  inferred  that  the 
advertisers  were  childless  and  hopeless  of  children ; 
how  unjustifiably  will  appear  by  the  following  exam- 
ple, which  appeared  a  few  days  ago  :  — 

"  A  lady  having  two  boys  would  like  to  adopt  one.  Inquire 
for  two  days  at  228  Sullivan  Street." 

This  lady,  quite  surely  an  Irish  emigrant  peasant 
woman,  wished  to  rid  herself  of  one  of  her  children. 

Affable.  —  A  use  of  this  word,  which  has  a  very 
ludicrous  effect  to  those  for  whom  it  has  the  significa- 
tion given  to  it  by  the  best  English  usage,  is  becom- 
ing somewhat  common  in  newspaper  correspondence 
and  accounts  of  what  are  therein  called  "  receptions  " 
and  "ovations."  It  means,  literally,  ready  to  speak, 
easily  approachable  in  conversation.  But  by  the 
usage  of  the  best  writers  and  speakers,  and  by  com- 
mon consent,  it  has  been  limited  to  the  expression  of 
an  easy,  courteous,  and  considerate  manner  on  the 
part  of  persons  of  superior  position  to  their  inferiors. 
A  king  may  be  affable,  as  Charles  II.  was  to  his 
attendants ;  and  so  may  a  nobleman  be  to  a  laborer. 
Dr.  Johnson  at  the  height  of  his  career  might  have 
been  affable  to  a  penny-a-liner,  but  he  was  n't.  Gen- 
eral Washington  was  not  affable,  but  Aaron  Burr 
was.  Milton  ealis  Raphael  "  the  affable  archangel," 
and  makes  Adam  say  to  him,  as  he  is  about  departing 
heavenwarJ, — 


MISUSED   WORDS  76 

"  Gentle  to  me  and  affable  liatli  been 
Thy  condescension,  and  shall  be  honored  ever 
With  grateful  memory." 

But  in  "  American  "  newspapers  we  now  read  of  affa- 
ble hotel-keepers  and  affable  steamboat  captains  ;  and 
we  are  told  that  Mrs.  Bullions,  at  her  "  elegant  and 
recherche  reception,"  although  moving  in  a  blaze  of 
diamonds,  tempered  by  a  clotid  of  j^oint  cle  Venise 
lace,  was  "  very  affable  to  her  guests."  Far  be  it 
from  me  to  suppose  that  there  may  be  a  difference 
between  a  hotel-keeper  and  an  archangel,  or  to  hint 
that  the  true  sense  of  this  word  may  be  preserved  in 
this  usage  by  there  being  the  same  distance  between 
a  steamboat  captain  and  a  reporter  that  there  was 
between  Raphael  and  Adam.  That  suggestion  is 
made  by  the  reporters  themselves.  Perhaps  this 
usage  is  one  of  the  signs  of  the  levelling  power  of 
democracy,  and  affability  is  about  passing  away  among 
the  vanished  graces. 

Aggravate  is  misused  by  many  persons  ignorantly, 
and,  in  consequence,  by  many  others  thoughtlessly, 
in  the  sense  of  provoke,  irritate,  anger.  Thus :  He 
aggravates  me  by  his  impudence  —  meaning  he  angers 
me :  Her  martyr-like  airs  were  very  aggravating  — 
the  right  word  being  irritating.  The  following  ex- 
ample is  from  an  elaborate  article  in  the  critical  col- 
umns of  a  newspaper  of  high  pretensions :  "  This 
lovely  girl,  so  different  in  her  naive  ways  and  lady- 
like carriage  from  all  her  homely  surroundings,  puz- 
zles Felix,  aggravates  him,  and  finally  leads  him  into 
attempting  to  infuse  more  of  seriousness  into  her 
nature."  The  writer  meant  that  Esther  provoked  or 
irritated  Felix.  Her  conduct  and  bearing  called  forth, 
i.  e.,  pro-voked,  certain  action  on  his  part.     Aggra- 


76  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

vate  means  merely  to  add  weight  to.  Injury  is  aggra- 
vated by  the  addition  of  insult.  Thus,  in  Howell's 
" Letters "  (sec.  V.  12) :  "This  [opposition]  aggravates 
a  grudge  the  French  king  hath  to  the  duke  for  siding 
with  the  Imperialists."  An  insult  may  be  aggravated 
by  being  offered  to  a  man  who  is  courteous  and  kindly, 
as  it  may  be  palliated  by  being  offered  to  a  brute  and 
a  bully.  But  it  is  no  more  proper  to  say  in  the  one 
case  that  the  person  is  aggravated,  than  in  the  other 
to  say  that  he  is  palliated. 

Alike  is  very  commonly  couj^led  with  hoth  in  a 
manner  so  unjustifiable  and  so  inconsistent  with  reason 
as  to  make  the  resulting  phrase  as  gross  a  bull  as  was 
ever  perpetrated.  For  example  :  "  Those  two  pearls 
are  both  alike."  This  is  equal  to  the  story  of  Sam 
and  Jem's  resembling  each  other  very  much,  particu- 
larly Sam.  When  we  say  of  two  objects  that  they 
are  alike,  we  say  that  they  are  like  each  other  —  that 
is,  simply,  that  one  is  like  the  other.  For  the  purpose 
of  comparing  one  with  the  other,  they  must  be  kept 
in  mind  separate  ;  but  by  using  hoth^  we  compare 
them  as  two  together,  not  separately  one  with  the~ 
other.  Both  means  merely,  and  only,  the  two  to- 
gether. Etymologically  it  means  the  two  two,  and  it 
corresponds  to  the  French  phrase  tous  les  deux.  Of 
two  objects  we  may  say  that  both  are  good,  and  that 
they  are  equally  good ;  but  not  that  both  are  equally 
good,  which  we  do  say  if  we  say  that  both  alike  are 
good.  The  authority  of  very  long  and  very  eminent 
usage  can  be  brought  in  support  of  hoth  alike ;  but 
this  is  one  of  those  points  upon  which  such  authority 
is  of  no  weight ;  for  the  phrase  is  not  an  idiom,  and 
it  is  at  variance  with  reason.  The  error  is  more  and 
other  than  pleonastic  or  than  tautological.     It  is  quite 


MISUSED  WORDS  77 

like  that  which  I  heard  from  a  little  girl,  —  a  poor 
street  waif,  —  who  told  a  companion  that  she  "  had 
two  weenie  little  puppy-dogs  at  home,  and  they  were 
both  brothers." 

Allude  is  in  danger  of  losing  its  peculiar  signifi- 
cation, which  is  delicate  and  serviceable,  by  being 
used  as  a  fine-sounding  synonym  of  say  or  inentlon. 
The  honorable  gentleman  from  the  State  of  Kokeeko, 
speaking  of  the  honorable  gentleman  from  the  same 
State,  denounces  him  as  a  drunken  vagabond  and  a 
traitor  to  his  party.  The  latter  rises  and  says  that  his 
colleague  has  alluded  to  him  in  terms  just  fit  for  such 
a  scoundrelly  son  of  a  poor-house  drab  to  use,  but  that 
he  hurls  back  the  honorable  gentleman's  allusions, 
and  so  forth,  and  so  forth.  The  spectacle  is  a  sad  one 
to  gods  and  men,  and  also  to  all  who  have  respect  for 
the  English  language.  For  whatever  may  have  been 
the  case  with  the  other  words,  allude  and  allusion 
were  used  in  their  Kokeekokiau,  certainlj'^  not  in  their 
English,  sense.  Allude  (from  ludo,  ludere,  to  play) 
means  to  indicate  jocosely,  to  hint  at  playfully,  and 
so  to  hint  at  in  a  slight,  passing  manner.  Allusion 
is  the  by-play  of  language.  "  The  Round  Table " 
having  said,  some  months  ago,  that  a  certain  article 
in  "  The  Galaxy  "  was  "  respectably  didl,"  the  writer 
thereof  amused  himself  by  turning  off  for  the  next 
number  the  following  epigram  :  — 

"  Some  knight  of  King  Arthur's,  Sir  Void  or  Sir  Null, 
Swears  a  trifle  I  wrote  is  respectably  dull. 
He  is  honest  for  once  through  his  weakness  of  wit, 
And  he  censures  a  fault  that  he  does  not  commit ; 
For  he  shows  by  example  —  proof  quite  unrejectable  — 
That  a  man  may  be  dull  without  being  respectable." 

Here  the  journal  in  question  is  not  mentioned,  but  it 
is  alluded  to  in  the  first  line  in  such  a  manner  that 


78  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

any  person  acquainted  with  the  press  of  New  York 
could  not  doubt  as  to  the  one  intended. 

Allow.  —  A  western  misuse  of  this  word  is  creep- 
ing eastward  ;  and  sometimes,  owing  to  the  elevating 
effect  of  suddenly  acquired  wealth,  is  heard  in  fash- 
ionable if  not  cultivated  circles.  It  is  used  to  mean 
say,  assert,  express  the  opinion.  E.  g.  "  He  was 
mightily  took  with  her,  and  allowed  she  was  the  hand- 
somest lady  in  Muzzouruh."  We  may  allow,  or  admit, 
that  which  we  have  disputed,  but  of  which  we  have 
been  convinced  ;  or  we  may  allow  certain  premises  as 
the  basis  of  argument;  but  we  assert,  not  allow,  our 
own  opinions. 

Animal.  —  It  would  seem  that  man  is  about  to  be 
deprived  of  the  rank  to  which  he  is  assigned  by  Ham- 
let —  that  of  being  the  paragon  of  animals.  Man, 
like  the  meanest  worm  that  crawls,  is  an  animal.  His 
grade  in  the  scale  of  organic  life  makes  him  neither 
the  more  nor  the  less  an  animal.  And  yet  many  peo- 
ple affect  to  call  only  brutes  animals.  Is  this  because 
they  are  ashamed  of  the  bond  which  binds  them  to  all 
living  creatures  ?  Do  they  scorn  their  poor  relations  ? 
On  this  supposition  Mr.  Bergh  might  account  for  that 
lack  of  sympathy,  the  absence  of  which  causes  the 
cruelty  of  some  men  to  their  dumb  fellow-beings,  were 
it  not  that  in  past  days,  when  no  one  had  thought  of 
taking  man  out  of  the  animal  kingdom,  brutes  were 
more  hardly  treated  than  they  are  now.  Mr.  Bergh's 
society  —  like  that  in  London,  of  which  it  is  a  copy  — 
is  called  The  Society  for  the  Prevention  of  Cruelty  to 
Animals.  It  is  in  reality  a  society  for  the  prevention 
of  cruelty  to  brutes ;  for  the  animal  that  suffers  most 
from  cruelty  —  man  —  appears  not  to  be  under  the 
shield  of  its  protection. 


MISUSED   WORDS  79 

Antecedents.  —  The  use  of  this  word  as  in  the 
question,  What  do  you  know  of  that  man's  antece- 
dents ?  is  not  defensible,  except  upon  the  bare  plea  of 
mutual  agreement.  For  in  meaning  it  is  awkward 
perversion,  and  in  convenience  it  has  no  advantage. 
Antecedent,  an  adjective,  meaning  going  before,  might 
logically  be  used  as  a  substantive,  to  mean  those  per- 
sons or  things  which  have  preceded  any  person  or 
thing  of  the  same  kind  in  a  certain  position.  Thus 
the  antecedents  of  General  Sherman  in  the  oener- 
alship  of  the  army  of  the  United  States  are  Gen- 
eral Washington,  General  Scott,  and  General  Grant. 
There  are  also  the  substantive  uses  of  the  word  in 
grammar,  logic,  and  mathematics.  But  to  call  the 
course  of  a  man's  life  until  the  present  moment  his 
antecedents  is  nearly  as  absurd  a  misuse  of  language 
as  can  be  compassed.  And  it  is  a  needless  absurdity. 
For  if,  instead  of.  What  do  you  know  of  his  antece- 
dents ?  it  is  asked.  What  do  you  know  of  his  previous 
life  ?  or,  better.  What  do  you  know  of  his  past  ?  there 
is  sense  instead  of  nonsense,  and  the  purpose  of  the 
question  is  fully  conveyed. 

Apt.  —  This  little  word,  the  proper  meaning  of 
which  it  is  almost  impossible  to  express  by  definition 
or  periphrasis,  is  in  danger  of  losing  its  fine  sense,  and 
of  being  degraded  into  a  servant  of  general  utility  for 
the  range  of  thought  between  liahle  and  lihely.  I  have 
before  me  a  letter  published  by  a  woman  of  some  note, 
who,  asking  for  contributions  to  her  means  of  nursing 
sick  and  wounded  soldiers,  says  that  anything  directed 
to  her  at  a  certain  place  "  will  be  apt  to  come."  The 
blunder  is  amusing.  I  have  no  doubt  it  provoked 
many  smiles ;  and  yet  how  delicate  is  the  line  which 
divides  this  use  of  the  word  from  the  correct  one !  To 


80  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

say  that  a  package  will  be  ajjt  to  come  is  inadmis- 
sible ;  but  to  say  that  it  would  be  apt  to  miscarry 
would  provoke  no  remark.  This  lady  meant  that  the 
packages  would  be  likely  to  come.  Her  error  was  of 
the  same  sort  as  that  o£  the  member  from  the  rural 
districts,  who,  driving  into  a  village,  called  out  to  a 
person  whom  he  met,  "  I  say,  mister,  kin  yer  tell  me 
where  I  'd  be  liable  to  buy  some  beans  ?  "  A  man  is 
liable  to  that  to  which  he  is  exposed,  or  obliged,  or  sub- 
ject ;  but  he  is  not  liable  to  act.  He  is  liable  to  take 
cold,  to  pay  another  man's  debts,  or  to  incur  his  wife's 
displeasure.  He  is  liable  to  fall  in  love  ;  but,  unless 
he  is  a  very  weak  brother,  he  is  not  liable  to  marry. 
Aptness  and  liability  both  express  conditions  —  one 
of  fitness  and  readiness,  the  other  of  exposure  —  in- 
herent in  the  person  or  thing  of  which  they  are  predi- 
cated. A  man  may  be  liable  to  catch  the  plague  or  to 
fall  in  love,  and  yet  not  be  apt  to  do  either.  For 
manhood's  sake  we  would  not  say  of  any  man  that  he 
is  liable  to  be  married  ;  yet,  under  certain  circum- 
stances, most  men  are  apt  to  be  married ;  and  having 
done  so,  a  man  is  liable,  and  may  be  apt,  to  have  a 
family  of  children.  Shakespeare  makes  Julius  Caesar 
say  of  Cassius,  — 

"  I  fear  him  not ; 
Yet  if  my  name  were  liable  to  fear, 
I  do  not  know  the  man  I  should  avoid 
So  soon  as  that  spare  Cassius." 

Caesar  might  have  said,  "  if  I  were  liable  to  fear  "  as 
well  as  "  if  my  name  were  liable."  He  could  have  said, 
"  if  I  were  apt  to  fear,"  but  not,  "  if  my  name  were 
apt  to  fear." 

Artist  is  a  much  abused  word,  and  one  class  of 
men  misuse  it  to  their  own  injury,  —  the  painters,— 


MISUSED   WORDS  81 

who  seem  to  think  that  artist  is  a  more  dignified 
name  than  jiainter.  But  artist  has  been  beaten  out  so 
thin  that  it  covers  ahnost  the  whole  field  of  human 
endeavor.  A  woman  who  turns  herself  upside  down 
iil^on  the  stage  is  an  artist ;  a  cook  is  an  artist ;  so  is 
a  barber  ;  and  Goldsmith  soberly  calls  a  cobbler  an 
artist.  The  word  has  been  so  pulled  and  hauled  that 
it  is  shapeless,  antl  has  no  peculiar  fitness  to  any  craft 
or  profession  ;  its  vagueness  deprives  it  of  any  special 
meaning.  Its  only  value  now  is  in  the  acknowledg- 
ment of  the  expression  of  an  aesthetic  purpose,  or, 
rather,  of  any  excellence  beyond  that  which  is  merely 
utilitarian.  The  painters  say  that  they  assume  it 
lest  they  should  be  confounded  with  house-painters. 
The  excuse  is  as  weak  as  water.  If  they  are  liable 
to  such  confusion,  or  fear  it,  so  much  the  worse  for 
them.  Leonardo,  Raphael,  Michael  Angelo,  Correg- 
gio,  Titian,  were  content  to  be  called  painters.  True, 
they  were  decorative  house-painters.  But  the  same 
name  satisfied  Rubens,  Vandyke,  Reynolds,  and 
Stuart,  who  did  not  paint  houses. 

Balance,  in  the  sense  of  rest,  remainder,  residue, 
remnant,  is  an  abomination.  Balance  is  metaphori- 
cally the  difference  between  two  sides  of  an  account  — 
the  amount  which  is  necessary  to  make  one  equal  to 
the  other.  It  is  not  the  rest,  the  remainder.  And  yet 
we  continually  hear  of  the  balance  of  this  or  that 
thing,  even  the  balance  of  a  congregation  or  of  an 
army !  This  use  of  the  word  has  been  called  an 
Americanism.  But  it  is  not  so  :  witness  this  passage 
from  "  Once  a  Week  :  "  — 

"  Whoso  wishes  to  rob  the  night  to  the  best  advantage,  let  him 
sleep  for  two  or  three  hours,  then  get  up  and  work  for  two 
hours,  and  then  sleep  out  the  balance  of  the  night.  Doing 
this,  he  will  not  feel  the  loss  of  the  sleep  he  has  surrendered." 


82  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

Bountiful.  —  This  word  is  very  generally  mis- 
used both  in  speech  and  in  writing.  The  jjhrase,  a 
bountiful  dinner,  a  bountiful  breakfast,  or,  to  be  fine, 
a  bountiful  repast,  is  continually  met  with  in  news- 
papers, wherein  we  also  read  of  bountiful  receipts  at 
the  box-offices  of  theatres,  and  even,  in  a  leading 
article  of  a  journal  of  the  first  class  now  before  me, 
of  "  bountifully  filled  hourly  trains." 

This  use  of  the  word  altogether  perverts  and 
degrades  it  from  its  true  meaning,  which  is  too  valu- 
able to  be  lost  without  an  effort  for  its  preservation. 
Bountiful  applies  to  persons,  not  to  things,  and  has 
no  reference  to  quantity ;  although  quantity  in  bene- 
fits received  is  often  the  consequence  of  bountifulness 
in  the  giver.  Lady  Bountiful  was  so  named  because 
of  the  benefits  she  conferred.  But  the  things  that 
she  gave  — the  food  and  clothing  —  were  not  bounti- 
ful. A  breakfast  or  dinner  which  is  paid  for  by  those 
who  eat  it,  has  no  relations  of  any  kind  to  bounty ; 
but  it  may  be  plentiful ;  and  if  it  is  given  in  alms  or 
in  compliment,  it  will  be  plentiful  because  the  giver 
is  bountiful.  The  repasts,  collations,  and  banquets, 
above  referred  to,  were  plentiful ;  the  receipts  at  the 
theatres  large ;  and  the  trains  well  filled  or  crowded. 

Bring,  Fetch.  —  The  misuse  and  confusion  of 
these  two  words,  which  are  so  common,  so  rooted  for 
centuries  in  the  deep  soil  of  our  vernacular,  would 
indicate  a  very  great  unsettling  of  the  foundations  of 
our  language,  were  it  not  that  the  perversion  is  con- 
fined almost  entirely  to  cities.  You  will  hardly  find 
an  English  or  a  Yankee  farmer  who  is  content  to 
speak  his  mother  tongue  as  his  mother  spoke  it,  who, 
without  taking  thought  about  it,  does  not  use  these 
words  as  correctly  as  persons  bred  in  the  most  culti- 


MISUSED    WORDS  83 

v^ated  society.  But  people  filled  with  the  conscious- 
ness of  fine  apparel  are  heard  saying  to  their  shop 
boys,  "  Go  to  such  or  such  a  place,  and  bring  this 
parcel  with  you  ;  and,  say  !  you  may  fetch  that  other 
one  along."  Now,  h7'ing  expresses  motion  toward, 
not  away.  A  boy  is  propei-ly  told  to  take  his  books 
to  school,  and  to  bring  them  home.  But  at  school  he 
may  correctly  say,  I  did  not  bring  my  books.  Fetch 
expresses  a  double  motion  —  first  from  and  then  to- 
ward the  speaker.  Thus,  a  gardener  may  say  to  his 
helper,  "  Go  and  bring  me  yonder  rake ; "  but  he 
might  better  say,  "  Fetch  me  yonder  rake,"  i.  e.,  go 
and  bring  it.  And  so  we  find  in  our  English  Bible 
(Acts  xxviii.  13),  "  and  from  thence  we  fetched  a 
compass ;  "  i.  e.,  we  went  out,  around,  and  back,  making 
a  circuit.  The  distinction  between  bring  and  fetch  is 
very  sharply  drawn  in  the  following  passage,  (1  Kings 
xvii,  11)  :  "  And  as  she  was  going  to  fetch  it,  he 
called  to  her  and  said.  Bring  me,  I  pray  thee,  a  morsel 
of  bread."  From  this  usage  of  these  words  there  is 
DO  justifiable  variation.  The  slang  phrase  —  "a  fetch  " 
—  is  hardly  slang,  for  it  expresses  a  venture,  i.  e.,  a 
metaphorical  going  out  to  bring  something  in. 

Calculate.  —  A  very  common  misuse  of  this  word 
should  be  corrected.  I  do  not  mean  that  of  which 
the  gentleman  from  the  rural  districts  is  guilty  when 
he  cahlc'lates  he  kin  do  a  pooty  good  stroke  of  work 
for  himself  when  he  gets  into  the  Legislatur,  but  that 
which  prevails  much  more  widely,  and  among  people 
who  think  no  evil  of  their  English,  and  who  would 
say,  for  instance,  that  the  nomination  of  Mr.  Greeley 
to  the  Presidency  was  calculated  to  deprive  the  Dem- 
ocrats of  the  votes  of  Free  Traders.  It  was  calcu- 
lated to  do  no  such  thins:.     Who  needs  to  be  told  that 


84  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

no  such  object  entered  into  the  calculations  of  the  lead- 
ing Democrats  ?  But  this  use  of  the  word  has  even 
the  very  high  authority  of  Goldsmith  to  support  it :  — ■ 

"  The  only  danger  that  attends  the  multiplicity  of  publica- 
tions is,  that  some  of  them  may  be  calculated  to  injure  rather 
than  benefit  society."  —  Citizen  of  the  World,  Letter  XXIV. 

Now,  calculate  means  to  compute,  to  reckon,  to 
work  out  by  figures,  and,  hence,  to  project  for  any 
certain  purpose,  the  essential  thought  expressed  by 
it,  in  any  case,  being  the  careful  adjustment  of  means 
to  an  end.  But  Goldsmith  did  not  mean  that  the 
authors  of  the  books  he  had  in  mind  intended  to  in- 
jure society,  and  wrote  with  that  end  in  view.  He  did 
mean  that  these  books  might  contain  something  that 
would  do  society  an  injury.  Calculate,  used  in  this 
sense,  is  only  a  big,  wrongful  pretender  to  the  place 
of  two  much  better  words  —  likely  and  apt.  Gold- 
smith meant  to  express  a  fear  that  the  books  in 
question  were  likely  to  injure  society ;  and  whether 
Mr.  Greeley's  nomination  was  likely  to  cost  his  party 
the  Free  Trade  vote,  is  a  matter  of  opinion  ;  but 
whether  it  was  calculated  to  do  so,  is  not. 

Calibre  is  used  with  a  radical  perversion  of  its 
meaning  by  many  persons  who  should  know  better. 
As,  for  instance,  — 

"  She  has  several  other  little  poems  of  a  much  higher  calibre 
than  that."  —  London  Spectator,  February  20,  1869. 

The  writer  of  this  sentence  might  as  well  have  said, 
a  broader  altitude,  a  bulkier  range,  or  a  thinner  cir- 
cumference. Calibre  is  the  measure  of  the  mass  con- 
tained or  containable  in  a  cavity ;  e.  g.,  the  calibre  of 
a  bullet  or  a  brain,  and  hence  of  a  gun  or  a  skull. 
Therefore  its  metaphorical  use  is  for  the  expression  of 


MISUSED   WORDS  85 

capacity,  and  its  proper  augmentatives  are  of  expan- 
sion, not  of  height  or  depth. 

Caption.  —  The  affectation  of  fine,  big-sounding 
words  which  have  a  flavor  of  classical  learning  has 
had  few  more  laughable  or  absurd  manifestations 
than  the  use  of  caption  (which  means  seizure,  act  of 
taking),  in  the  sense,  and  in  the  rightful  place,  of 
heading.  In  our  newspapers,  even  in  the  best  of  them, 
it  is  too  common.  This  monstrous  blunder  was  first 
made  by  some  person  who  knew  that  captain  and  cap- 
ital expressed  the  idea  of  headship,  but  who  was  suffi- 
ciently ignorant  to  suppose  that  cajition^  from  its 
similarity  in  sound  to  those  words,  had  a  kindred 
meaning.  But  captain  and  cajntal  are  from  the 
Latin  caputs  a  head  ;  and  cajJtion  is  from  capio,  I 
seize,  captum,  seized.  Language  rarely  suffers  at  the 
hands  of  simple  ignorance ;  by  which  indeed  it  is 
often  enriched  and  strengthened  ;  but  this  absurd  mis- 
use of  caption  is  an  example  of  the  way  in  which  it  is 
made  mere  empty  sound,  by  the  pretentious  efforts 
of  presuming  half-knowledge.  Captivate  —  a  word 
closely  connected  with  cap)tion  —  once,  indeed,  its 
relative  verb  —  is,  on  the  other  hand,  an  interesting 
example  of  the  perfectly  legitimate  change,  or  limita- 
tion, which  may  be  made  by  common  consent  in  a 
word's  meaning.  Captivate  means  primarily  to  seize, 
to  take  captive,  and,  until  within  a  few  years,  com- 
paratively, it  was  used  in  that  sense.  But  within  the 
last  two  generations  it  has  been  so  closely  limited  to 
the  metaphorical  expression  of  the  act  of  charming 
by  beauty  of  person  and  insnaring  by  wiles  and  win- 
ning ways,  that  it  seems  very  strange  to  read  in  one 
i>f  Washington's  letters  that  "  our  citizens  are  fre' 
quently  captivated  by  Algerine  pirates." 


86  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

Catch  is  very  generally  misused  for  reach,  get  to, 
overtake.  Many  persons  speak  of  catching  a  car.  If 
they  reach  the  car,  or  get  to  it,  it  being  at  the  station, 
or  if,  it  being  in  motion,  they  overtake  it  or  catch  up 
with  it,  they  may  catch  some  person  who  is  in  it,  or 
they  may  catch  scarlet  fever  from  some  one  who  has 
been  in  it.     But  they  will  not  catch  the  car. 

Character,  Reputation.  —  These  words  are  not 
synonyms ;  but  they  are  too  generally  used  as  such. 
How  commonly  do  we  hear  it  said  that  such  or  such  a 
man  "  bore  a  very  bad  character  in  his  vicinity,"  the 
speaker  meaning  that  the  man  was  of  bad  repute  in 
his  neighborhood !  We  know  very  little  of  each 
other's  characters  ;  but  reputations  are  well  known  to 
us,  except  our  own.  Character,  meaning  first  a  figure 
cr  letter  engraved,  means  secondarily  those  traits  which 
are  peculiar  to  any  person  or  thing.  Reputation  is,  ■ 
or  should  be,  the  result  of  character.  Character  is 
the  sum  of  individual  qualities  :  reputation,  what  is 
generally  thought  of  character,  so  far  as  it  is  known. 
Character  is  like  an  inward  and  spiritual  grace,  of 
which  reputation  is,  or  should  be,  the  outward  and 
visible  sign.  A  man  may  have  a  good  character  and 
a  bad  reputation,  or  a  bad  character  and  a  good  repu- 
tation, —  although,  to  the  credit  of  human  nature, 
which,  with  all  its  weakness,  is  not  ignoble,  the  latter 
is  more  common  than  the  former.  Coleridge  uses 
character  incorrectly  when  he  says  (Friend  I.  16), 
"  Brissot,  the  leader  of  the  Gironde  party,  is  entitled 
to  the  character  of  a  virtuous  man."  Sheridan  errs 
in  like  manner  in  making  Sir  Peter  Teazle  say,  as  he 
leaves  Lady  Sneerwell's  scandalous  cotei-ie,  "  1  leave 
my  character  behind  me."  His  reputation  he  left, 
but  his  character  was  always  in  his  own  keeping. 


MISUSED  WORDS  87 

Chastity.  —  Priestcraft  and  asceticism  have  caused 
a  confusion  of  this  word  with  continence  —  a  confu- 
sion which  has  lasted  for  centuries,  and  may  yet  last 
for  many  generations.  Even  such  a  priest-hater  as 
Froude  says  of  Queen  Catherine  that  she  was  invited 
to  take  the  vows,  and  enter  what  was  called  the  relu/io 
laxa  —  a  state,  he  adds,  "  in  which  she  might  live 
unencumbered  by  obligation,  except  the  easy  one  of 
chastity."  Does  Mr.  Froude  mean  that  Catherine 
would  have  been  more  chaste  as  a  secular  nun  than 
she  was  as  Henry's  wife  ?  that  a  man  is  to  look  upon 
his  mother  or  his  wife  as  less  chaste  than  his  maiden 
aunt  ?  He,  of  course,  meant  no  such  absurdity  ;  he 
merely  fell  in  with  a  bad  usage.  He  should  have 
said,  except  the  easy  obligation  of  continence.  Chas- 
tity is  a  virtue.  Continence,  under  some  circum- 
stances, is  a  duty,  but  is  never  a  virtue,  it  being 
v/ithout  any  moral  quality  whatever. 

Citizen  is  used  by  some  writers  for  newspapers 
with  what  seems  like  an  affectation  of  the  Fi-ench 
usage  of  citoyen  in  the  first  Republic.  For  instance : 
"  General  A  is  a  well-known  citizen,  and  responsible 
for  these  grave  charges  ;  "  or,  "  Several  citizens  car- 
ried the  sufferer  to  a  drug  store  on  the  next  block." 
A  citizen  is  a  person  who  has  certain  political  rights, 
and  the  word  is  properly  used  only  to  imply  or  sug- 
gest the  possession  of  these  rights.  The  sufferer  was 
cared  for  by  several  persons,  bystanders,  or  passen- 
gers, some  or  all  of  whom  might  have  been  aliens. 
The  writer  might  as  well  have  said  that  the  sufferer 
was  carried  off  by  several  church  members  or  several 
Free  Masons. 

Clarionet  and  Violincello  are  constantly  used 
for  clarinet  and  violoncello.     There  was  a    stringed 


88  WORDS  AND   THEIR   USES 

instrument  which  has  long  been  disused,  and  which 
was  called  the  violone.  It  was  large,  and  very  differ- 
ent from  the  violino.  A  small  instrument  of  the  kind 
was  made,  and  called  the  violoncello  (cello  being  an 
Italian  diminutive)  ;  and  this,  somewhat  modified,  is 
the  modern  instrument  of  that  name.  Violincello 
would  be  the  name  of  a  little  violin  ;  whereas  a  violon-' 
cello  is  four  times  as  large  as  a  violin.  A  similar 
contraction  of  word  and  thing  has  given  us  clarinet 
(clarinetto^  from  clarino. 

Consider  is  perverted  from  its  true  meaning  by 
most  of  those  who  use  it.  Men  will  say  that  they  do 
not  consider  a  certain  course  of  conduct  right  or  pol- 
itic—  that  they  do  not  consider  Mr.  So-and-So  a 
gentleman  —  and  even  that  they  do  not  consider  goose- 
berry tart  equal  to  strawberry  shortcake.  Now  con- 
sidere  (the  infinitive  of  consido^  on  which  consider 
is  formed,  means  to  sit  down  deliberately,  to  dwell 
upon,  to  hold  a  sitting,  to  sit  in  judgment ;  and  hence 
consider  by  natural  process  came  to  mean  to  ponder, 
to  contemplate.  And  there  seems  to  have  been  more 
than  a  mere  happy  fancy  in  the  notion,  now  abandoned, 
that  consider  was  from  con^  with,  and  sidera,  the  stars, 
and  meant  to  take  counsel  with  the  stars,  to  peer  into 
the  future  by  watching  the  heavens.  A  court  reserves 
its  opinion  that  it  may  consider  a  question  which  it 
sometimes  has  for  weeks  under  consideration.  A 
business  man  asks  until  to-morrow  to  consider  your 
proposition,  and  meantime  he  ponders  it,  i.  e.,  weighs 
it  carefully,  ruminates  upon  it.  A  man  whose  ability, 
character,  or  position  gives  weight  to  his  opinion,  is  a 
man  of  consideration,  because  what  he  says  is  worthy 
to  be  considered  ;  and  whatever  is  large  enough  or 
strons:  enous'h  to  deserve  serious  attention  is  consider* 


MISUSED   WORDS  89 

able.  All  this  fine  and  useful  sense  of  tlie  word  is 
lost  by  making  it  a  mere  synonym  of  think,  s^qjj^ose^ 
or  regard. 

Consummate.  —  Of  all  the  queer  uses  of  big  words 
which  are  creeping'  into  vogue,  the  use  of  this  word, 
both  in  speech  and  in  the  newspapers,  to  express  the 
performance  of  the  marriage  ceremony,  is  the  queerest. 
For  instance,  I  heard  a  gentleman  gravely  say  to  two 
ladies,  "  The  marriage  was  consummated  at  Paris  last 
April."  Now,  consummation  is  necessary  to  a  com- 
jilete  marriage ;  but  it  is  not  usually  talked  about 
openly  in  general  society.  The  gentleman  meant  that 
the  ceremony  took  place  at  Paris. 

Couple.  —  Although  the  misuse  of  this  word  is 
very  common,  and  of  long  standing,  the  perversion  of 
meaning  in  the  misuse  is  so  great  that  it  cannot  be 
justified,  even  by  time  and  custom.  It  is  used  to 
mean  simply  two  ;  as,  for  instance,  "  A  couple  of  ladies 
fell  upon  the  ice  yesterday  afternoon."  "  Five  work- 
ingmen,  stimulated  by  the  prospect  of  a  couple  of 
small  money  prizes,  offered  by  an  enterprising  local 
firm,  delivered  speeches,"  etc.  —  "  Pall  Mall  Gazette," 
March  6,  1869.  Why  people  should  use  these  three 
syllables,  couple  of\  to  say  incorrectly  that  which  one 
syllable,  tico,  expresses  correctly,  it  is  hard  to  tell. 
It  would  be  quite  as  correct  in  the  above  examples  to 
say,  a  brace  of  ladies,  and  more  surely  correct  to  say 
a  pair  of  prizes.  For  a  couple  is  not  only  two  indi- 
viduals who  are  in  a  certain  degree,  at  least,  equal  or 
like,  i.  e,,  a  pair,  but  two  that  are  bound  together  by 
some  close  tie  or  intimate  relationship ;  who,  in  brief, 
are  coupled.  Two  railway  cars  are  bound  together  by 
the  coupling ;  a  man  and  a  woman  are  made  a  couple 
by  the  bond  of  sexual  love,  wliich  even  the  legal  bond 


90  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

of  marriage  cannot  accomplish ;  for  a  man  and  his 
wife  may  be  separated,  and  be  no  longer  a  couple^ 
Twins,  even,  are  not  a  couple,  but  a  pair.  In  cowple^ 
which  is  merely  the  Latin  coinila  Anglicized,  this  idea 
of  copulative  conjunction  is  inherent.  So  William 
Lilly,  in  his  "  Short  Introduction  of  Grammar,"  de= 
iines  jugum  as  "  a  yoke,  or  a  yoke  of  oxen,  that  is,  a 
couple."  It  is  as  incorrect  and  as  absurd  to  speak  of 
a  couple  of  ladies,  or  a  couple  of  prizes,  as  of  a  couple 
of  earthquakes  or  a  couple  of  comets. 

Convene  is  much  perverted  from  its  true  meaning 
by  many  people  who  cannot  be  called  illiterate.  Thus  : 
The  President  convened  Congress.  Convene  (from 
con  and  venioj  means  to  come  together.  The  right 
word  in  this  case  is  convoke,  which  (from  coji  and 
voco')  means  to  call  together.  The  President  con- 
vokes Congress  in  special  session,  and  then  Congress 
convenes.  Convene  is  misused  in  the  Constitution  of 
the  United  States  itself,  which  is  singularly  free  from 
errors  in  the  use  of  language. 

Crime.  —  The  common  confusion  of  the  words 
crime,  vice,  and  sm,  is  probably  due,  in  a  great  mea- 
sure, to  a  failure  to  distinguish  the  things.  The  dis- 
tinction was  long  ago  made,  although  hardly  with 
sufficient  exactness.  Crime  is  a  violation  of  the  law 
of  a  particular  country.  What  is  crime  in  one  coun- 
try may  not  be  crime  in  another  ;  what  is  crime  in  one 
country  at  one  time  may  not  be  crime  in  the  same 
country  at  another  time.  Sin  is  the  violation  of  a 
religious  law,  which  may  be  common  to  many  coun- 
tries, and  yet  be  acknowledged  by  only  a  part  of  the 
inhabitants  of  any  one.  What  is  sin  among  Jews  or 
Mahommedans  is,  in  some  cases,  not  sin  among  Chris- 
tians, and  vice  versa,     yice  has  been  defined  as  a  vio- 


MISUSED   WORDS  91 

/ation  o£  the  moral  law ;  but  to  make  this  definition 
exact  in  terms  and  universal  in  application,  a  consent 
as  to  the  requirements  of  the  moral  law  is  necessary. 
Vice  is  a  course  of  action  or  habit  of  life  which  is 
harmful  to  tlie  actor  or  wrongful  to  others.  The 
viciousness  of  an  act  is  quite  irrespective  of  the  coun- 
try or  the  creed  of  the  person  who  commits  it,  or  of 
the  people  among  whom  it  is  committed.  That  which 
is  criminal  may  be  neither  sinful  nor  vicious;  that 
which  is  sinful,  neither  criminal  nor  vicious ;  and  that 
which  is  vicious,  neither  criminal  nor  sinful.  Thus, 
smuggling  is  a  crime,  but  neither  a  sin  nor  a  vice ; 
covetousness  and  blasphemy  are  sins  and  vices,  but 
not  crimes ;  gambling  is  a  crime  and  a  vice,  but  not  a 
sin  ;  idleness  is  vice,  but,  in  itself,  neither  sin  nor 
crime;  while  theft  is  criminal,  sinful,  and  vicious. 
The  magnitude  of  the  wrong  in  some  acts  raises  them 
above  or  sinks  them  below  the  level  of  vice.  Murder 
is  not  a  vice.  It  would  not  be  well  to  speak  of  Herod's 
slaughter  of  the  innocents  as  a  vicious  or  even  a  very 
vicious  act.  The  idea  of  continuity,  or  of  possible 
continuity,  of  a  habit  of  action  is  conveyed  in  the  word 
vice.  Filial  disrespect  is  vicious  ;  but  the  same  cannot 
be  said  of  parricide ;  for  although  parricide  is  filial 
disrespect  carried  to  the  extreme,  it  cannot  become  a 
habit,  because  a  man  can  have  but  one  father  and  one 
mother. 

Decimated.  —  The  learned  style  of  that  eminent 
and  ambitious  writer,  the  War  Correspondent,  has 
brought  this  word  into  vogue  since  the  Rebellion,  but 
with  a  sense  somewhat  different  from  that  in  which  it 
was  used  by  his  guide  and  model,  Caius  Julius  Caisar. 
After  the  battle  on  the  Rapidan,  or  the  Chattanooga, 
he  —  I  do  not  mean  the  greater  of  the  two  eminent 


92  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

persons,  and  probably  the  former  will  admit  that  C.  J. 
Cffisar  was  the  more  distinguished  even  as  a  writer 
upon  military  affairs  —  used  to  say,  in  his  fine  Roman 
style,  that  the  army  was  "  awfully  decimated,"  as  in 
one  of  the  many  instances  before  me :  "  The  troops, 
although  fighting  bravely,  were  terribly  decimated, 
and  gave  way."  Old  Veni-vidi-vici  would  tell  him 
that  he  might  as  well  have  written  that  the  troops 
were  terribly  halved  or  frightfully  quartered.  When 
a  Roman  cohort  revolted,  and  the  revolt  was  put  down, 
a  common  punishment  was  to  decimate  the  cohort  — 
that  is,  select  every  tenth  man,  decimus,  by  lot,  and 
put  him  to  death.  If  a  cohort  suffered  in  battle  so 
that  about  one  man  in  ten  was  killed,  it  was  conse- 
quently said  to  be  decimated.  But  to  use  decimation 
as  a  general  phrase  for  great  slaughter  is  simply  ridi- 
culous. The  exact  equivalent  of  this  usage  would  be 
to  say.  The  troops  were  terribly  tithed. 

Defalcation  is  misused  on  all  sides  and  every  day 
in  the  sense  of  default  or  defaulting.  Defalcation  is 
the  noun  of  the  verb  defalcate.,  which  means  to  lop 
off,  and  so  to  detract  from.  Congress  might  defalcate 
the  tariff,  and  the  defalcation  might  be  large  or  small ; 
but  it  would  not  be  a  default.  A  default  might  be 
made  by  any  officer  intrusted  with  the  collections  of 
the  customs  duties.  If  he  should  not  pay  these  into 
the  treasury,  he  would  default,  i.  e.,  fail  in  his  duty, 
and  be  a  defaulter ;  but  he  would  not  defalcate,  nor 
would  his  act  be  a  defalcation. 

Dirt  means  filth,  and  primarily  filth  of  the  most 
offensive  kind.  A  thing  that  is  dirty  is  foul.  The 
word  has  properly  no  other  meaning.  And  yet  some 
women,  intelligent  and  well  educated,  say  that  they 
like  to  ride  on  "a  dirt  road."     They  mean  a  ground 


MISUSED  WORDS  93 

road,  an  earth  road,  a  gravel  road,  or,  in  general 
terms,  an  unpaved  road.-  Dirt  is  used  by  some  per- 
sons as  if  it  meant  earth,  loam,  gravel,  or  sand ;  and 
we  sometimes  hear  "  clean  dirt "  spoken  of.  There  is 
no  such  thing. 

Divine.  —  The  use  of  this  adjective  as  a  noun, 
meaning  a  clergyman,  a  minister  of  the  gospel,  is 
supported  by  long  usage  and  high  authority.  In 
"  Richard  III."  Buckingham  points  out  to  the  Mayor 
of  London  the  hypocritical  Gloster  "  meditating  with 
two  deep  divines."  Chaucer  calls  the  priest  Calchas 
a  divine.  Yet  I  cannot  but  regard  this  use  of  the 
word  as  at  variance  with  reason,  as  fantastic  and 
extravagant.  Think  it  over  a  little,  and  say  it  over  a 
few  times  —  a  divine,  a  divine  —  meaning  a  sort  of 
man  !  It  might  be  more  blasphemous  to  leave  out  the 
article,  and  call  the  man  divine  ;  but  would  it  be  quite 
as  absurd  ?  This  use  of  this  adjective  as  a  noun  has  a 
parallel  in  the  calling  a  philosopher  "  a  philosophic," 
which  is  done  in  a  newspaper  article  before  me  ;  in 
the  more  common  designation  of  a  child  as  "  juvenile," 
and  even  of  books  for  children  as  "  juveniles ;  "  in  the 
phrase  "  an  obituary,"  meaning  an  obituary  article ; 
and  in  the  name  "  monthly,"  which  is  sometimes  given 
to  a  literary  magazine  ;  all  of  which  are  equally  at 
variance  with  reason  and  with  good  taste.  In  either 
case  the  thing  is  deprived  of  its  substantive  name,  and 
designated  by  an  unessential,  accidental  quality. 

Dock  is  by  many  persons  used  to  mean  a  wharf  or 
pier ;  thus  ;  He  fell  off  the  dock,  and  was  drowned. 
A  dock  is  an  open  place  without  a  roof,  into  which 
anything  is  received,  and  where  it  is  enclosed  for 
safety.  A  prisoner  stands,  or  used  to  stand,  in  the 
dock  at  his  trial.     A  ship  is  taken  into  a  dock  for 


94  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

repairs.  The  Atlantic  Dock  is  properly  named. 
The  shipping  around  a  city  lies  at  wharfs  and  piers, 
but  goes  into  docks.  A  man  might  fall  into  a  dock ; 
hut  to  say  that  he  fell  off  a  dock  is  no  better  than  to 
say  that  he  fell  off  a  hole. 

Dress  has  the  singular  fortune  of  being  misused  by 
one  sex  only.  By  town-bred  women,  both  in  Great 
Britain  and  the  United  States,  and  by  that  very  large 
and  wide-spread  rural  class  who  affect  town-bred  airs, 
dress  is  used  for  goxon ;  and  thus  woman,  in  a  very 
unhousewifely  way,  takes  from  one  good  servant  half 
his  rights,  and  throws  another  out  of  place  entirely, 
thereby  leaving  herself  short-handed.  The  radical 
idea  expressed  in  the  word  djress  is,  right ;  and  dress^ 
the  verb,  means  simply  to  set  right,  to  put  in  order. 
A  captain  of  infantry  orders  his  company  to  dress  to 
the  right —  that  is,  to  bring  themselves  into  order,  into 
line,  by  looking  to  the  right.  The  kitchen  dresser  is 
so  called  because  upon  it  dishes  are  put  in  order.  As 
to  the  body,  dress  is  that  which  puts  it  in  order,  in 
a  condition  comfortable  and  suitable  to  the  circum- 
stances in  which  it  is  placed.  Dress  is  a  general 
term,  including  the  entire  apparel,  the  under  garments 
as  well  as  the  outer.  No  man  thinks  of  calling  his 
coat  or  his  waistcoat  his  dress,  more  than  of  so  calling 
his  shirt  or  his  stockings.  But  women  do  so  call  the 
gown ;  and  thus  they  use  a  word  which  is  a  vague, 
general  term,  and  is  applicable  to  all  apparel,  and  be- 
longs to  men  as  much  as  to  women,  instead  of  one 
which  means  exactly  that  which. they  wish  to  express 
—  a  long  outer  garment,  extending  from  the  shoulder 
below  the  knee.  Froch^  sometimes  used  for  goivn^  is 
properly  of  more  limited  application,  although  it  be- 
lonirs  both  to  masculine   and    feminine  attire.     The 


MISUSED   WORDS  95 

origin  of  the  perversion  is  probably  untraceable,  ex- 
cept by  the  aid  of  some  woman  of  close  observation 
and  reflection,  who  is  old  enough  to  have  been  brought 
up  to  say  goicn.  Such  a  person  might  be  able  to  tell 
us  how  and  why,  in  a  little  more  than  a  generation, 
this  word  has  come  to  be  thus  perverted  by  her  sex 
only. 

Editorial.  —  An  unpleasant  Americanism  for 
leader  or  leading  article^  which  name  is  given  to  the 
articles  in  newspapers  upon  the  leading  topics  of  the 
day.  These  articles  are  not  generally  written  by 
the  editor  of  the  paper,  although  he  is  responsible  for 
them  ;  but  so  is  he  for  the  other  articles,  and  for  the 
correspondence.  And  even  were  the  case  otherwise, 
leader  or  leading  article  would,  none  the  less,  be  a 
good  descriptive  name  for  them,  and  editorial  would 
be  poor,  both  for  its  meagre  significance,  and  for  its 
conversion  of  an  adjective,  not  signifying  a  quality,  as 
good  or  ill^  into  a  noun. 

Esquire.  —  An  attempt  to  deprive  any  citizen  of 
this  democratic  republic  of  his  right  to  be  called  an 
esquire  by  his  friends  and  all  his  correspondents, 
would  be  an  outrage  upon  our  free  institutions,  and 
perhaps  treason  to  the  natural  rights  of  man,  whatever 
they  may  be.  Upon  this  subject  I  confess  myself  fit 
only  to  be  a  learner  ;  but  I  have  yet  to  discover  what 
a  man  means  when  he  addresses  a  letter  to  John  Dash, 
Esq.  (who  is  in  no  manner  distinguished  or  distin- 
guishable from  other  Dashes),  except  that  Mr.  Dash 
shall  think  he  means  to  be  polite. 

Evacuate.  —  This  word  is  often  subjected  to  the 
same  kind  of  ill  treatment  from  which  leave  suffers. 
Thus :  General  Pemberton  expects  to  evacuate  to- 
morrow about  nine  A.  M.  ;  or,  The  enemy  evacuated 


96  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

last  night.  Evacuate  does  not  mean  to  go  away,  but 
to  make  empty ;  and  when  the  word  is  used  in  regard 
to  military  movements,  evacuation  is  a  mere  conse- 
quence, result,  or,  at  most,  concomitant  of  the  going 
away  of  the  garrison.  For  obvious  reasons  the  men- 
tion of  the  place  departed  from  is  in  this  case  particu- 
larly necessary. 

Every.  —  A  gross  misuse  of  this  word  has  been 
brought  into  vogue  within  the  last  few  years  on  both 
sides  of  the  water  —  the  first  offenders  having  been 
people  who  wished  to  be  elegant,  but  who  did  not 
know  enough  to  be  correct ;  the  others  being  their 
thoughtless  followers.  Thus,  General  Napier,  writ- 
ing to  Disraeli  from  Abyssinia,  said,  "  The  men  de- 
serve every  praise  ;  "  "  The  Tribune  "  says  that 
"  Congress  has  exercised  every  charity  in  its  treatment 
of  the  President ; "  a  manager  is  reported  as  having 
said  that  as  a  certain  actor  has  recovered  his  health, 
he,  the  manager,  "  has  every  confidence  in  announcing 
him  "  ;  and  we  see  grateful  people  acknowledging,  in 
testimonials,  that  in  their  trouble  such  or  such  a  cap- 
tain, or  landlord,  "  rendered  them  every  assistance." 
This  is  absurdly  wTong.  Every  is  separative,  and  can 
be  applied  only  to  a  whole  composed  of  many  individ- 
uals. Composed  originally  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  cp/er, 
ever,  and  celc^  each,  its  course  of  descent  has  been 
evercelc,  everilk,  everich,  every.  It  means  each  of  all, 
not  all  in  mass.  It  cannot,  therefore,  be  applied  to 
that  which  is  in  its  very  nature  inseparable.  The 
manager  might  as  well  have  said  that  he  had  multi- 
tudinous confidence  as  that  he  had  every  confidence. 
He  meant  perfect  or  entire  confidence  ;  and  the  grate- 
ful people,  that  the  captain  rendered  them  all  possible 
assistance.     Such  a  sentence,  too,  as  the  following, 


MISUSED  WORDS  97 

from  the  work  of  an  admired  British  novelist,  is  ab- 
surd :  "  Every  hmnan  being  has  this  in  common." 
All  human  beings  might  have  something  in  common  ; 
but  what  every  man  has,  he  has  individually  for 
himself. 

Executed.  —  A  vicious  use  of  this  word  has  pre- 
vailed so  long,  become  so  common,  that,  although  it 
produces  sheer  nonsense,  there  is  little  hope  of  its 
reformation,  except  in  case  of  that  rare  occurrence  in 
the  history  of  language,  a  vigorous  and  persistent 
effort  on  the  part  of  the  best  speakers  and  writers 
and  professional  teachers  toward  the  accomplishment 
of  a  special  purpose.  The  perversion  referred  to  is 
the  use  of  executed  to  mean  hanged,  beheaded,  put  to 
death.  Thus  a  well-known  historian  says  of  Anne 
Boleyn  that  "  she  was  tried,  found  guilty,  and  exe- 
cuted ; "  and  in  the  newspapers  we  almost  always  read 
of  the  "  execution  "  of  a  murderer.  The  writers  de- 
clare the  performance  of  an  impossibility.  A  law  may 
be  executed  ;  a  sentence  may  be  executed  ;  and  the 
execution  of  the  law  or  of  a  sentence  sometimes,  al- 
though not  once  in  a  thousand  times,  results  in  the 
death  of  the  person  upon  whom  it  is  executed.  The 
coroner's  jury,  which  sits  in  the  prison-yard  upon  the 
body  of  a  felon  who  has  been  hanged,  brings  in  its 
formal  verdict,  "  Execution  of  the  law."  To  execute 
(from  sequor}  is  to  follow  to  the  end,  and  so  to  carry 
out,  and  to  perform  ;  and  how  is  it  possible  that  a 
human  being  can  be  executed  ?  A  plea  of  metaphor- 
ical or  secondary  use  will  not  save  the  word  in  this 
sense  ;  for  the  law  or  a  sentence  is  as  much  executed 
when  a  condemned  felon  is  imprisoned  as  when  he  is 
put  to  death.  But  who  would  think  of  saying  that  a 
man  was  executed  because  he  was  shut  up  in  the  state 


98  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

prison  ?  And  even  were  it  not  so,  liow  much  simpler 
and  more  significant  a  use  of  language  to  say  that  a 
felon,  or  a  victim  of  tyi*anny,  had  been  hanged,  be- 
headed, shot,  or  generally  put  to  death,  than  to  say 
he  was  executed  !  of  which  use  of  this  word  there  is 
no  justification,  its  only  palliation  being  that  afforded 
by  custom  and  bad  example. 

Exemplary.  —  Archbishop  Trencli  has  pointed  out 
that  a  too  common  use  of  this  word  makes  it  "  little 
more  than  a  loose  synonym  for  excellent^  Its  proper 
meaning  is,  that  which  serves  for  an  example.  Cer- 
vantes' Novelets  exemj)lares  were  so  called,  because 
each  of  them  furnished  an  example.  The  misuse  of 
cxcmjjlary  confines  it  to  examples  that  should  be  fol- 
lowed. But  some  examples  are  not  to  be  followed. 
A  man  is  hanged  for  an  example.  Othello  says, 
"  Cassio,  I  '11  make  an  example  of  thee."  The  lan- 
guage would  gain  a  word  by  the  restriction  of  ex- 
emijlary  to  its  proper  meaning.  Example  itself  is  too 
often  loosely  used  for  iwohlem.  A  problem  often  is 
an  example  of  the  operation  of  a  rule,  but  not  always  ; 
and  in  any  case  its  exemplary  is  not  its  essential 
character. 

Expect  is  very  widely  misused  on  both  sides  of  the 
water  in  the  sense  of  suppose,  think,  guess,  —  e.  g.^ 
"  I  expect  you  had  a  pretty  hard  time  of  it  yesterday." 
Expect  refers  only  to  that  which  is  to  come,  and 
which,  therefore,  is  looked  for  (ex,  out,  and  spectare^ 
to  look).     We  cannot  expect  backward. 

Experience.  —  Perhaps  an  objection  to  the  use  of 
this  word  as  a  verb  has  no  better  ground  than  that  of 
taste  or  individual  preference,  which  should  be  ex- 
cluded from  discussions  like  the  present ;  yet  I  am 
inclined  to  make  that  objection  very  strongly.     We 


MISUSED   WORDS  99 

are  told,  for  instance,  in  a  London  newspaper  of  re- 
pute, that  an  Armenian  archbishop  who  penetrated 
into  Ab3'ssinia  at  the  request  of  the  British  authori- 
ties, "  fell  into  the  hands  of  some  barbarous  tribes  of 
that  district,  from  whom  he  is  experiencing  very  rough 
usage."  He  was  receiving  or  suffering  rough  usage  ; 
and  although  that  was  part  of  his  experience,  he  did 
not  experience  it.  Experience  is  the  passing  through 
a  more  or  less  continuous  course  of  events  or  trials. 
A  man's  experience  is  the  sum  of  his  life  ;  his  experi- 
ence in  any  profession,  business,  or  condition  of  life, 
is  the  aggregate  of  the  observation  he  has  had  the 
opportunity  of  making  in  that  profession,  business,  or 
condition.  Experience  should  be  a  means  of  obtain- 
ing knowledge  and  imderstanding,  but  it  is  not  so 
always.  Some  men  learn  much  by  experience  ;  most 
men,  very  little  ;  many,  nothing.  Experience  is  akin 
to  experiment,  both  being  derived  from  the  same  Latin 
word,  experio7\  exp)erimentu'm,  the  idea  expressed  by 
which  is  trial.  But  experiment  is  voluntary  trial, 
experience  involuntary.  In  experiment  the  trier  is 
an  agent ;  in  experience,  an  observer,  and  often  a 
sufferer.  He  not  only  tries,  but  is  tried  himself. 
Natural  science  advances  by  experiments  which  are 
undertaken  by  scientific  men,  and  an  experiment  is  a 
positive  fact,  of  which  all  men  may  avail  themselves 
according  to  their  knowledge  and  ability  ;  but  experi- 
ence is  of  little  value  except  to  him  who  has  passed 
through  it.  From  the  noun  experience  is  formed  the 
participial  adjective  experienced  (which  is  not  the  per- 
fect participle  of  a  verb  exjjcrience^,  as  moneyed  from 
money,  landed  from  land,  talented  from  talent,  case- 
mated  from  casemate,  hattlemented  from  hattlement. 
Battlemented  is  not  a  part  of  a  verb  —  /  hattlement. 


100     .  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

thou  hattlementest^  etc. ;  nor  talented  from  a  verb  —  / 
talent^  thou  talentest,  etc.  So  an  experienced  man  is 
a  man  of  experience,  not  one  who  has  been  experi- 
enced, i.  e.,  according  to  the  dictionaries  has  been 
tried,  proved,  observed,  but  one  who  has  tried,  has 
proved,  has  observed.  Of  the  use  of  experience  as  an 
active  transitive  verb,  I  have  been  able  to  find,  by  dil- 
igent search,  only  one  example  of  any  authority  —  the 
following,  quoted  by  Richardson  from  "  The  Guar- 
dian :  "  —  "  the  maxim  of  common  sense  —  that  men 
ought  to  form  their  judgments  of  things  unexperienced 
from  what  they  have  experienced."  The  examples 
easiest  to  find  are  such  as  the  following,  furnished  by 
an  incensed  farmer :  "  Wal,  I  '11  be  durned  ef  ever  I 
exper'enced  sech  a  cussed  cross-grained  crittur  as  that 
in  all  my  life  ;  "  the  cross-grained  creature  which  the 
speaker  experienced  being  a  cow  that  kicked  over  the 
milk-pail.  That  this  is  not  an  extreme  case,  take 
the  following  examples  in  evidence  —  the  first  from 
the  London  "  Spectator,"  the  second  from  "  The  Mark 
Lane  Express,"  two  high-class  British  newspapers  : 
"  The  attempt  to  adapt  ourselves  by  temporary  expe- 
dients to  a  climate  which  we  experience  [to  which  we 
are  exposed]  about  once  in  twenty  or  thirty  years  ;  " 
"  The  hay  crop  is  one  of  the  most  deficient  experienced 
[that  we  have  had]  in  many  years."  Now,  if  we  may 
experience  a  hot  day,  or  experience  a  hay  crop,  can 
we  refuse  to  experience  a  cow,  without  coming  athwart 
the  stupendous  principle  of  equal  rights  for  everybody 
and  everything,  and  subjecting  ourselves  to  discipline 
at  the  hands  of  Mr.  Bergh's  society  ?  Let  us  bear, 
suffer,  try,  live  through,  endure,  prove,  and  undergo  ; 
and  from  all  this  we  shall  gain  experience  and  become 
experienced  ;  but  let  us  not  experience  either  a  hay 
crop,  or  a  cow,  nor  indeed  any  other  thing. 


MISUSED   WORDS  101 

Extend.  —  The  fondness  for  fine  words  leads  lec- 
ture committees,  and  other  like  public  bodies,  to  pro- 
pose to  "  extend  an  invitation  "  to  one  distinguished 
man  or  other,  instead  of  merely  asking  him,  inviting 
him,  or  giving  him  an  invitation  ;  as,  for  instance,  it 
was  reported  by  telegraph  that  "  an  invitation  had 
been  extended  to  Reverdy  Johnson  "  to  dine  with  the 
Glasgow  bailies  ;  and  in  the  dedication  of  a  book  of 
some  ability,  upon  an  important  literary  subject,  the 
compliment  is  said  to  be  paid  "  in  remembrance  of 
the  kind  interest  extended  to  the  author."  An  inter- 
est may  be  taken  or  shown  in  a  man,  or  his  labors ; 
but  to  extend  an  interest  is  to  make  that  interest 
larger.  A  man  who  has  ten  thousand  dollars  in  a 
business,  and  puts  in  ten  thousand  more,  extends  his 
interest  in  that  business.  And,  moreover,  as  extend 
(from  ex  and  tendo^  means  merely  to  stretch  forth,  it 
is  much  better  to  say  that  a  man  put  out,  offered,  or 
stretched  forth  his  hand,  than  that  he  extended  it. 
Shakespeare  makes  the  pompous,  pragmatical  Malvo- 
lio  say,  "  I  extend  my  hand  to  him,  thus ;  "  but  Paul 
"  stretched  forth  the  hand  and  answered  for  himself." 
This,  however,  is  a  question  of  taste,  not  of  correct- 
ness. 

Fly  is  very  frequently  misused  for  flee.  It  has 
even  been  questioned  whether  there  is  a  real  differ- 
ence between  these  two  words.  Certainly  there  is ; 
the  distinction  is  valid  and  useful.  Flee  is  a  general 
term,  and  means  to  move  away  with  voluntary  rapid- 
ity ;  fly  away  is  of  special  application,  and  means  to 
move  with  wings,  either  quickly  or  slowly.  True,  the 
words  have  the  same  original ;  but  so  have  sit  and  set, 
lie  and  lay.  The  needs  of  language,  guided  by  in- 
stinct, we  know  not  exactly  how,  effected  the  distinc- 


102  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

tlon  between  these  pairs  of  words,  and  it  has  been 
confirmed  by  the  usage  of  many  centuries.  The  simi- 
larity between  the  members  of  each  pair  is  so  great, 
and  they  are  so  easily  confused,  that  it  is  difficult  to 
decide  what  was  the  usage  of  any  one  of  our  older 
authors  except  in  those  cases  in  which  their  works 
were  very  carefully  printed  under  their  own  eyes. 
The  worth  of  the  distinction  and  the  real  difference 
involved  in  it  will  appear  by  reading,  instead  of  "  Sis- 
era  lighted  down  off  his  chariot  and  fled  away  on  his 
feet,"  Sisera  lighted  down  off  his  chariot  and  flew 
away  on  his  feet,  or  for  "  the  arrow  that  flieth  by  day," 
the  arrow  that^ee^/i  by  day. 

Get,  one  of  the  most  willing  and  serviceable  of  our 
vocal  servants,  is  one  of  the  most  ill  used  and  imposed 
upon,  —  is  indeed  made  a  servant  of  all  work,  even 
by  those  who  have  the  greatest  retinue  of  words  at 
their  command.  They  use  the  word  get  —  the  radical, 
essential,  and  inexpugnable  meaning  of  which  is  the 
attainment  of  possession  by  voluntary  exertion  —  to 
express  the  ideas  of  possessing,  of  receiving,  of  suffer- 
ing, and  even  of  doing.  In  all  these  cases  the  word 
is  misused.  A  man  gets  riches,  gets  a  wife,  gets  chil- 
dren, gets  well  (after  falling  sick),  and,  figuratively, 
gets  him  to  bed,  gets  up,  gets  to  his  journey's  end,  — 
in  brief,  gets  anything  that  he  wants  and  successfully 
strives  for.  But  we  constantly  hear  educated  people 
speak  of  getting  crazy,  of  getting  a  fever,  and  even  of 
getting  a  flea  on  one.  A  man  hastening  to  the  train 
will  say  that  he  is  afraid  of  getting  left,  and  tell  you 
afterward  that  he  did  or  did  not  get  left,  meaning  that 
he  is  afraid  of  being  left,  and  that  he  was  or  was  not 
left. 

The  most  common  misuse  of  this  word,  however,  is 


MISUSED  WORDS  103 

to  express  simple  possession.  It  is  said  of  a  man  that 
he  has  got  this,  that,  or  the  other  thing,  or  that  he  has 
not  got  it ;  what  is  meant  being  simply  that  he  has  it, 
or  has  it  not ;  the  use  of  the  word  got  being  not  only- 
wrong,  but,  if  right,  superfluous.  If  we  mean  to  say 
that  a  man  is  substantially  wealthy,  our  meaning  is 
completely  expressed  by  saying  that  he  is  rich,  has  a 
large  estate,  or  has  a  handsome  property.  We  do  not 
express  that  fact  a  whit  better  by  saying  that  he  has 
got  rich,  or  has  got  a  large  estate ;  we  only  pervert  a 
word  which,  in  that  case,  is  at  least  entirely  needless, 
and  is  probably  somewhat  more  than  needless.  For 
it  is  quite  correct  to  say,  in  the  very  same  words,  that 
by  such  and  such  a  business  or  manoeuvre  the  man 
has  gotten  a  large  estate.  Possession  is  completely 
expressed  by  have  ;  get  expresses  attainment  by  exer- 
tion. Therefoi'e  there  is  no  better  English  than. 
Come,  let  us  get  home ;  but  to  say  of  a  vagrant  that 
he  has  got  no  home  is  bad.  So  we  read,  "  Foxes  have 
holes ;  birds  of  the  air  have  nests ;  but  the  Son  of 
Man  hath  not  where  to  lay  his  head,"  —  not,  have  got 
holes,  have  got  nests,  hath  not  got  where  to  lay  hi? 
head.  The  phrase.  He  got  the  property  through  his 
mother  or  by  his  wife,  is  common,  but  it  is  incorrect. 
An  estate  inherited  is  not  gotten.  The  correct  ex- 
pression is,  That  property  came  to  him  through  hi? 
mother,  or  by  his  wife.  This  word  has  a  very  wide 
range,  but  the  boundaries  which  it  cannot  rightfully 
pass  are  very  clearly  defined. 

There  is  among  some  persons  not  imeducated  or 
without  intelligence  a  doubt  about  the  past  participle 
of  got  —  gotten^  which  produces  a  disinclination  to  its 
use.  I  am  asked,  for  instance,  whether  gotten,  like 
1^1'oven,  belongs  to  the  list  of  "  words  that  are  not 


104  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

words."  Certainly  not.  Prove  is  what  the  grammars 
call  a  regular  verb ;  that  is,  it  forms  its  tenses  upon 
the  prevailing  system  of  English  verbal  conjugation, 
which  makes  the  perfect  tense  in  ed.  It  is  in  this 
respect  like  love,  the  example  of  regular  verbal  con- 
jugation given  in  most  grammars  ;  and  we  may  as  well 
say  that  Mary  has  loven  John  as  that  John's  love  for 
Mary  was  not  proven.  But  get  is  of  the  irregular 
conjugation,  in  which  the  preterite  tense  is  formed  by 
an  internal  vowel  change,  and  the  past  participle  in  ?^, 
with  or  without  such  vowel  change  ;  thus  —  get^,  gat, 
gotten.  The  number  of  these  irregular  verbs,  hav- 
ing what  is  well  called  a  strong  preterite,  is  large  in 
our  language,  of  which  they  are  a  very  fine  and  inter- 
esting feature,  and  one  that  we  should  solicitously 
preserve  with  their  original  native  traits  unchanged. 
They  are  all  pure  English,  and,  if  I  remember  rightly, 
nearly  all  of  them  monosyllables.  Such  are  do,  did, 
done;  hegin  [or  gin^,  hegan,  hegun ;  spin,  span, 
spun  ;  slay,  sleio,  slain  ;  fly,  flero,.  flown  ;  grow,  grew, 
grown  ;  eat,  ate,  eaten  ;  thrive,  throve,  thriven  ;  shake, 
shook,  shaken  ;  speak,  spake,  spoken ;  drink,  drank, 
drunken ;  get,  gat,  gotten. 

There  is  and  has  long  been,  even  among  educated 
people,  a  proneness  to  error  in  the  use  of  these  strong 
verbs.  A  weak  preterite  is  substituted  for  the  strong  ; 
the  participle  for  the  preterite.  The  former  varia- 
tion began  so  early,  and  became  so  common  in  the 
last  century,  that  it  has  been  assumed  to  indicate  a 
tendency  of  the  language.  Long  ago  it  was  noticed 
that  the  strong  conjugation  hardly  holds  its  own,  while 
all  new  verbs  are  conjugated  weak.  But  the  confu- 
sion of  preterite  and  participle  cannot  be  even  thus 
palliated.     Thus  Sterne  says,  "  At  the  close  of  such 


MISUSED  WORDS  105 

a  folio  as  this,  wrote  for  their  sake."  We  can  forgive 
Yorick  such  errors  as  this,  because  of  the  many  charm- 
ing pages  that  he  has  written  for  our  sake  ;  but  they 
were  committed  by  hundreds  of  others  who  have  not 
his  claims  upon  our  forbearance.  This  mistake,  by  the 
by,  is  rarely  made  by  writers  on  this  side  the  water. 
Pope  opens  his  "  Messiah  "  with  an  error  of  this  sort, 
into  which  he  frequently  falls. 

"Rapt  into  future  times  the  bard  begun: 
A  virgin  shall  conceive  and  bear  a  son." 

He  should,  of  course,  have  written  began  ;  and  if  the 
need  of  a  rhyme  were  pleaded  and  admitted  as  his 
excuse  in  this  instance,  it  would  not  avail  in  the  fol- 
lowing passage  in  his  "  Essay  on  Criticism,"  where  — 
of  all  places !  —  he  makes  the  blunder  at  the  begin- 
ning of  a  line,  in  the  body  of  which  he  weakens  a 
preterite  and  an  expression  together  :  — 

"  In  the  fat  age  of  pleasure,  -wealth,  and  ease, 
Sprung  [sprang]  the  rank  weed,  and  thrived  [throve]  with  large  in- 
crease." 

Again,  in  the  same  poem,  he  has  the  following  coup- 
let, without  the  excuse  of  rhyme,  making,  indeed,  the 
blunder  in  two  words  which  would  have  rhymed  as 
well  if  properly  used  :  — 

"  A  second  deluge  learning  thus  o'errun  [o'erran], 
And  the  monks  finished  what  the  Goths  begun  [began]." 

So  Savage,  in  his  "  Wanderer,"  is  guilty  of  the 
same  fault,  in  mere  wantonness,  it  would  seem,  or 
ignorance : — 

"  From  Liberty  each  nobler  science  sprung  [sprang], 
A  Bacon  brightened  and  a  Spencer  sung  [sang]." 

And  Swift  writes,  "  the  sun  has  rose,'"  "  will  have 
stole  it,"  and  "  have  mistook.'"  For  the  sake  of  illus- 
tration, I  cite  the  following  instance  of  the  right  iii'e 


106  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

of    the   strong   preterite  and  past   participle   in   the 
same  sentence :  — 

"A  certain  man  made  a  great  supper,  and  hade  many  ;  and 
sent  his  servant  at  supper-time  to  say  to  them  that  they  were 
hidden,  Come,  for  all  things  are  now  ready."  —  Luke  xiv.  17. 

The  confusion  of  the  preterite  and  the  past  parti« 
ciple  of  do,  which  is  so  frequent  among  entirely  illit- 
erate people  —  He  done  it,  for  He  did  it,  and  He  has 
did  it,  for  He  has  done  it  —  provokes  a  smile  from 
those  who  themselves  are  guilty  of  exactly  corre- 
sponding errors.  For  instance  :  He  begun  well,  for 
He  began  well ;  His  father  had  bade  him  to  go  home, 
for  His  father  had  bidden  him  go  home  ;  and  The  jury 
has  sat  a  long  while,  for  The  jury  has  sitten  a  long 
while.  Thus  got,  having  by  custom  been  poorly  sub- 
stituted for  gat,  so  that  we  say  He  got  away,  instead 
of  He  gat  away,  many  persons  abbreviate  gotten  into 
got,  saying  He  had  got,  for  He  had  gotten  ;  and  hence 
the  doubt  whether  gotten  is  not  really,  like  proven,  a 
word  that  is  no  word.  But  if  got  is  the  preterite  of 
get,  as  did  is  of  do.  He  had  got  is  an  error  of  the 
same  class  as  He  had  did  ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  if 
got  is  the  past  participle  of  get,  as  done  is  of  do.  He 
got  is  really  no  worse  than  He  done  —  only  more  com- 
mon among  people  of  some  education.  Among  such 
people  we  too  often  hear,  He  had  rode,  for  He  had  rid- 
den, and,  perhaps,  most  frequently  of  all  this  class  of 
errors,  I  had  dranh,  for  I  had  drunk,  or  (better)  I  had 
drunken,  and  I  drunh,  for  I  drank. 

Contrary  to  common  supposition,  the  irregularity 
lof  these  strong  verbs  is  not  in  their  deviation  from 
the  weak  form  of  conjugation  —  with  the  preterite  in 
ed  or  d.  They  have  merely  a  peculiar  form  of  conju- 
gation ;  and  their  inflections  (so  to  speak  of  an  inter- 


MISUSED   WORDS  107 

nal  change)  are  as  systematic  as  those  of  the  other 
and  larger  division  of  the  same  part  of  speech.  The 
really  irregular  verbs  are  the  strong  which  have  ac- 
quired weak  preterites.  We  have  all  of  us  laughed 
often  enough  at  "  First  it  blew,  and  then  it  snew,  and 
then  it  thew,  and  then  it  friz."  But  if  this  were  ever 
uttered  in  good  faith  (and  it  may  have  been  so),  it 
was  the  product  of  ignorance  only  as  to  the  last  word. 
Snew  is  the  regular  preterite  of  snow,  the  regular  past 
participle  of  which  is  not  snowed,  but  snovm.  E.  g.^ 
grow,  grew,  grown  ;  throw,  threw,  thrown  ;  blow,  blew, 
blown.  The  preterite  snew  is  to  be  found  in  our  early 
literature.  Gower  uses  it,  and  Douglas,  in  his  trans- 
lation of  the  -3]neid,  the  maker  of  the  glossary  to 
which  (said  in  an  old  manuscript  note  in  my  copy  to 
have  been  John  Urry)  erroneously  marks  it  as  a  Scot- 
ticism. Holinshed,  noticing  an  entertainment  called 
Dido,  given  in  the  year  1583,  says  that  in  the  course  of 
it,  "  it  snew  an  artificial  kind  of  snow  ;  "  and  in  the 
account,  given  in  Sprott's  "  Chronicles,"  of  the  battle 
of  Towton,  we  find  "  and  all  the  season  it  s?iew."  It  is 
only  according  to  present  usage  that  snow  is  an  irreg- 
ular verb ;  and  it  is  so  because  snowed  is  the  vagary 
of  some  man  struggling  long  ago  toward  supposed 
regularity.  The  regular  conjugation  of  these  verbs 
in  010  is  to  form  the  preterite  in  ew  and  the  past  par- 
ticiple in  wn  ;  as  throw,  threw,  thrown  ;  and  snow, 
snowed,  snov)ed  is  as  irregular  as  throw,  throwcd, 
throwed  would  be,  or  bloio.  Mowed,  blowed.  But 
although  there  is  high  authority  for  the  phrase,  "  You 
be  blowed,"  I  cannot  but  look  upon  it  quoad  Jibe  as 
a  corruption.  Shovj,  sow,  and  mow  have  been,  like 
snow^  perverted  from  their  regular  conjugation.  The 
conjugation,  according  to  the  usa<je  now  in  vogue,  is 


108  WORDS  iVND  THEIR  USES 

show,  showed,  shown,  sow,  sowed,  sown,  and  mow, 
mowed,  mown,  in  which  we  have  a  preterite  of  one  form 
of  conjugation,  and  a  past  participle  of  another  —  a 
union  of  incongruity  and  irregularity  quite  anomalous. 
But  the  regular  preterites  have  not  yet  been  quite 
ousted  by  the  interlopers.  In  some  parts  of  England 
mew  and  sew  are  still  heard  instead  of  mowed  and 
sowed.  In  some  parts  of  New  England,  and  notably 
in  Boston,  we  still  hear  from  intelligent  and  not  uned- 
ucated people.  He  shew  (pronounced  shoo)  me  the  way, 
which  is  sneered  at  by  persons  who  do  not  know  that 
shew  is  the  regular  and  showed  an  irregular  preterite, 
the  use  of  which  is  justified  only  by  custom.  The 
preterite  sheio  occurs  in  the  following  interesting  pas- 
sage of  the  Wycliffite  "  Apology  for  the  Lollards," 
written  about  A.  D.  1375,  in  which  there  is  the  Anglo- 
Saxon  preterite  strake,  of  strike :  — 

"  Sin  Jeshu  was  temptid,  he  overcam  hunger  in  desert,  he  de- 
spicid  auarice  in  the  hille,  he  strak  ageyn  veynglorie  upon  the 
temple  ;  that  he  scheio  to  us  that  he  that  may  ageynsey  his  womb 
[t.  e.,  deny  his  belly],  and  despice  the  goodis  of  this  world  and 
desire  not  veynglorie,  he  howith  [t.  e.,  oweth,  ought]  to  be  maad 
Christ's  vicar." 

Although  new  verbs  take  the  weak  form,  the  de- 
prived strong  verbs  have  for  two  generations  been 
reclaiming  their  own  preterites.  Some  of  the  latter 
were  nearly  lost  in  the  last  century,  when,  for  exam- 
ple, shined  for  shone,  drinhed  for  drank,  strived  for 
strove,  catched  for  caught,  teached  for  taught,  and 
heseeched  for  besought  were  common. ^  And  we  have 
digged  for  dug,  not  only  in  the  Bible  and  in  Shake- 
speare, but  earlier.  Now  good  writers  and  speakers 
^  "  If  parts  allure  thee,  think  how  Bacon  shin'd 
The  wisest,  brightest,  meanest  of  mankind." 

Pope,  Epistle  IV. 


MISUSED   WORDS  109 

use  the  strong  form  of  those  verbs.  The  fact  that 
some  of  them,  like  teach  and  catch.,  belonged  in  an  ear- 
lier stage  of  the  language  to  a  mixed  form  of  conjuga- 
tion, which  combined  the  vowel  change  of  the  strong 
with  the  terminal  inflection  of  the  weak,  has  no  bear- 
ing on  the  tendency  in  question.  It  is  not  impossible 
that  this  restoration  may  go  on.  The  participle  snoicn 
will,  I  think,  surely  resume  the  place  to  which  it  has 
the  same  right  asjlown  and  grown  have  to  theirs. 

Gratuitous.  —  An  affected  use  of  this  word  has 
of  late  become  too  common.  It  is  used  in  the  various 
senses,  unfounded,  unwarranted,  unreasonable,  untrue, 
no  one  of  which  can  be  given  to  it  with  propriety.  It 
is  not  thus  used  either  by  the  cultivated,  or  by  those 
who  speak  plain  English  in  a  plain  way,  they  know 
not  why  or  how,  and  who  are  content  to  call  a  spade 
a  spade.  Gratuitous  means,  without  payment ;  as, 
for  instance.  Professor  A.  delivered  a  gratuitous  lec- 
ture. What  meaning  can  it  have,  then,  in  a  sentence 
like  the  following  ?  "  The  assumption  of  Senator  Fes- 
senden,  that  a  man  who  goes  into  a  caucus  and  acts 
there  is  bound  to  vote  in  House  or  Senate  in  accord- 
ance with  the  decision  of  the  caucus  majority,  is  wholly 
gratuitous."  It  is  not  gratuitous ;  it  may  be  unwar- 
ranted, intolerable,  unreasonable.  But  this  word  is 
supposed  to  mean  something  else,  people  don't  know 
exactly  what  or  why,  and,  therefore,  because  of  this 
very  ignorance,  they  use  it.  For,  in  language,  the  un- 
known is  generally  taken  for  the  magnificent.  True, 
dictionaries  are  found  in  which  gratuitous  is  defined 
as  meaning  "  asserted  without  proof  or  reason."  But 
in  a  moment's  reflection  any  intelligent  person  will  see 
that  gratuitous  cannot  mean  asserted,  in  any  manner. 
Dictionaries  have  come  to  be,  in  too  many  cases,  the 


110  WORDS  AND   THEIR  USES 

pernicious  record  of  unreasonable,  unwarranted,  and 
fleeting  usage. 

Grow  is  even  more  perverted  than  get  is,  in  vulgar 
use,  although  the  misapplications  of  it  are  not  so  nu- 
merous. It  properly  means  to  increase,  and  expresses 
either  enlargement  or  development ;  it  is,  on  the  con- 
trary, widely  used  in  the  sense  of  become,  and  even  of 
diminish.  An  acorn  grows  into  an  oak,  an  eg^  into 
a  bird,  a  fish,  or  other  animal.  Grow  has  therefore 
normally  come  to  be  used  to  express  a  passage  from 
one  state  to  another ;  as,  to  grow  mild,  to  grow  faint, 
to  grow  dark.  But  what  is  large  cannot  be  reasonably 
said  to  grow  smaller :  e.  g.,  after  the  full,  the  moon 
grows  smaller.  It  lessens,  diminishes  ;  the  opposite  of 
growth.  And  in  general  even  a  change  of  condition 
is  more  accurately  expressed  by  become  than  by  grow. 

Help.  —  I  have  heard  objection  made  to  the  use  of 
this  word  "  in  the  sense  of  avoid,"  which  I  notice  only 
because  such  a  criticism  is  a  good  example  of  a  prim, 
precise  treatment  of  language  that  would  deprive  it  of 
all  strength  and  flexibility.  There  is  no  better  Eng- 
lish than  "  I  can't  help  it,"  which  is  a  compact  and 
homely  way  of  saying.  The  matter  is  beyond  my  aid. 
Aufidius,  when  he  is  told  that  the  presence  of  Coriola- 
nus  overshadows  him,  replies,  — 

"  I  cannot  help  it  now, 
Unless  by  using  means  I  lame  the  foot 
Of  our  design." 

But  the  use  of  the  word  in  this  sense  must  be  much 
older  than  Shakespeare's  poetry.  It  is  one  of  those 
quasi  idiomatic  uses  of  words  (impossible  in  this 
instance  in  French  or  Latin,  for  example)  that  are 
inevitable,  that  should  not  be  unsettled,  that,  indeed, 
cannot  be  helped.     There  is  no  surer  way  to  a  weak, 


MISUSED   WORDS  111 

poor,  artificial  style  than  the  sitting  in  judgment 
upon  the  use  of  words  and  phrases  of  spontaneous 
growth,  which  are  not  at  variance  with  reason,  and 
which  have  been  used  for  centuries  by  <Al  sorts  and 
conditions  of  men.  A  man  who  uses  lanouaoe  as 
Sampson,  the  valiant  retainer  of  the  Capulet,  bit  his 
thumb,  only  when  he  has  the  law  on  his  side,  will  soon 
come  to  write  like  an  attorney  drawing  a  law-paper. 

Help  Meet.  —  An  absurd  use  of  these  two  woi-ds, 
as  if  they  together  were  the  name  of  one  thing  —  a 
wife  —  is  too  common.  They  are  frequently  printed 
with  a  hyphen,  as  a  compound  word  ;  and  there  is 
your  man  who  thinks  it  at  once  tender,  respectful, 
biblical,  and  humorous  to  speak  of  his  wife  as  his 
help-meet ;  and  this  merely  because  in  Genesis  we  are 
told  that  woman  was  given  to  man  as  a  help  that  was 
meet,  fit,  suitable  for  him.  "  I  will  make  him  an  help 
meet  for  him ;  "  not  "  I  will  make  a  helpmeet  for  him." 
Our  biblical  friend  might  as  well  call  his  "  partner  " 
his  help-fit,  or  help-proper.  That  this  protest  is  not 
superfluous,  even  as  regards  people  of  education,  may 
be  seen  by  the  following  sentence  in  a  work  —  and  one 
of  ability,  too  —  on  the  English  language.  "  Heaven 
gave  Eve,  as  a  help-meet,  to  Adam."  Here  the  hyphen 
and  the  change  of  the  preposition  from  for  to  to, 
leave  no  doubt  as  to  the  nature  of  the  blunder,  which 
is  lamentable  and  laughable.  And  yet  Matthew  Har- 
rison, the  author  of  the  work  in  which  it  appears,  is 
not  only  a  clergyman  of  the  Church  of  England,  but 
Fellow  of  Queen's  College,  Oxford. 

So  a  writer  of  some  distinction  in  "  The  Galaxy  " 
says  that  "  woman  was  designed  by  her  Creator  to  be 
a  helpmeet  to  man  ;  "  and  we  are  told  in  a  leading 
article  in  "  The  Tribune "  on  Mormon  affairs,  that 


112  WORDS   AXD   THEIR   USES 

"  the  saints  have  gone  on  with  their  wholesale  marry- 
ing and  sealing,  and  the  head  prophet  has  taken  his 
forty-fifth  help-meet." 

Humanitarian  is  very  strangely  perverted  by  a 
certain  class  of  speakers  and  writers.  It  is  a  theo- 
logical word ;  and  its  original  meaning  is,  One  who 
denies  the  godhead  of  Jesns  Christ,  and  insists  upon 
his  human  nature.  But  it  is  used  by  the  people  in 
question,  whose  example  has  infected  others,  as  if  it 
meant  humane,  and  something  more.  Now,  as  the 
meaning  of  humane  is  recognizing  in  a  common  hu- 
manity a  bond  of  kindness,  good  will,  and  good  offices, 
it  is  difficult  to  discover  what  more  humanitarian,  if 
admitted  in  this  sense,  could  mean.  In  brief,  humane 
covers  the  whole  ground,  and  humanitarian,  used  in 
the  sense  of  widely  benevolent  and  philanthropic,  is 
mere  cant,  the  result  of  an  effort  by  certain  people  to 
elevate  and  to  appropriate  to  themselves  a  common 
feeling  by  giving  it  a  grand  and  peculiar  name.  Mr. 
Gladstone  uses  this  word  correctly  in  the  following 
passage,  in  which  he  is  speaking  of  the  Olympian 
system  of  theo-mythology  set  forth  by  Homer. 

"  Homer  reflected  upon  his  Olympos  the  ideas,  passions,  and 
appetites  known  to  us  all,  with  such  a  force  that  they  became 
with  him  the  paramount  power  in  the  construction  of  the  Greek 
religion.  This  humanitarian  element  gradually  subdued  to  it- 
self all  that  it  found  in  Greece  of  traditions  already  recognized, 
whether  primitive  or  modern,  whether  Hellenic,  Pelasgiaa,  or 
foreign."  —  Juventus  Mundi,  ch.  vii.,  p.  181. 

Ice-water,  Ice-cream.  —  By  mere  carelessness  in 
enunciation  these  compound  words  have  come  to  be 
used  iov  iced-water  and  iced-creani  —  most  incorrectly 
and  with  a  real  confusion  of  language,  if  not  of 
thouerht.      For  what  is  called  ice-water  is  not  made 


MISUSED   WORDS  113 

from  ice,  but  is  simply  water  iced,  that  is,  made  cold 
by  ice ;  and  ice-water  might  be  warm,  as  snow-water 
often  is.     Ice-cream  is  unknown. 

Inaugurate  is  a  word  which  might  better  be 
eschewed  by  all  those  who  do  not  wish  to  talk  high- 
flying nonsense,  else  they  will  find  themselves  led  by 
bad  examples  into  using  it  in  the  sense  of  begin, 
open,  set  up,  establish.  The  Latin  word,  of  which  it 
is  merely  an  Anglicized  form,  meant  to  take  omens 
from  the  flight  of  birds  and  the  inspection  of  their 
entrails  and  those  of  beasts,  and  hence  was  applied 
to  the  occasions  at  which  such  omens  were  chiefly 
sought.  To  inaugurate  is  to  receive  or  induct  into 
ofiice  with  solemn  ceremonies.  The  occasions  are 
very  few  in  regard  to  which  it  may  be  used  with  pro- 
priety. But  we  shall  read  ere  long  of  cooks  in- 
augurating the  preparation  of  a  dinner,  and  old  Irish 
women  inaugurating  a  peanut  stand  ;  as  well  these  as 
inaugurating,  instead  of  opening,  a  ball,  or  inaugurat- 
ing, instead  of  setting  up  or  establishing  a  business. 
Howell  affords  the  following  good  example  of  the 
figurative  use  of  the  v^ord :  "  To  inaugurate  a  good 
and  jovial  year,  I  send  you  a  morning's  draught,  viz., 
a  bottle  of  metheglin." —  (Letters,  iv.  41.) 

Initiate  is  one  of  the  long,  pretentious  words  that 
are  coming  into  vogue  among  those  who  would  be 
fine.  It  means  begin ;  no  more,  no  less.  It  may  be 
more  elegant  to  say.  The  kettle  took  the  initiative, 
than  to  use  the  homelier  phrase  to  which  our  ears 
have  been  accustomed  ;  but  I  have  not  been  able  to 
make  the  discovery.  And  I  may  as  well  here  de- 
spatch a  rabble  of  such  words,  all  of  kindred  origin 
and  pretentious  seeming.  Unless  a  man  is  a  crown 
prince,  or  other  important  public  functionary,  it  is 


114  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

well  for  him  to  have  a  house  and  a  home,  where  he 
lives,  not  a  place  of  residence,  where  he  resides. 
From  this  let  him  and  his  household  go  to  church  or 
to  meeting,  if  they  like  to  do  so  ;  but  let  not  the  in- 
mates proceed  to  the  sanctuary.  And  if,  being  able 
and  willing  to  do  good,  he  gives  something  to  the 
parson  for  the  needy,  let  him  send  his  cheque,  and  not 
transmit  it.  Let  him  oversee  his  household  and  his 
business,  not  siqjervise  them.  Let  him  reject,  disown, 
refuse,  or  condemn  what  he  does  not  like,  but  not 
repudiate  it,  unless  he  expects  to  cause  shame,  or  to 
suffer  it,  in  consequence  of  his  action  ;  and  what  he 
likes  let  him  like  or  approve  or  uphold,  but  not  in- 
dorse ;  and,  indeed,  as  to  indorsing,  let  him  do  as 
little  of  that  as  possible.  I  have  come  from  preten- 
sion into  the  shop,  and,  therefore,  I  add,  that  if  he 
is  informed  upon  a  subject,  has  learned  all  about  it, 
knows  it,  and  understands  it,  let  him  say  so,  not  that 
he  is  well  posted  on  it.  He  will  say  what  he  means, 
simply,  clearly,  and  forcibly,  rather  than  preten- 
tiously, vulgarly,  and  feebly.  It  is  noteworthy  and 
significant  that  the  man  who  will  say  that  he  is  posted 
up  on  this  or  that  subject,  is  the  very  one  who  will 
use  such  a  foolish,  useless,  pretentious  word  as  recu- 
perate, instead  of  recover.  Thus  the  Washington 
correspondent  of  a  leading  journal  wrote  that  General 
Grant  and  Mr.  Speaker  Colfax  expected  to  start  for 
Colorado  on  the  first  of  July,  and  that  their  trip  is 
'•'  for  the  sole  purpose  of  recuperating  their  health." 
If  the  writer  had  omitted  five  of  the  eight  words 
which  he  used  to  express  the  purpose  of  the  travel- 
lers, and  said  the  trip  is  "  for  health  only,"  his  sen- 
tence would  have  been  bettered  inversely  as  the 
square  of  the  number  of  words  omitted.     But  it  will 


MISUSED  WORDS  116 

not  do  to  be  so  very  exacting  as  to  ask  people  not  to 
use  many  more  words  than  are  necessary,  and  so  all 
that  can  be  reasonably  ho})ed  for  is,  that  rccnjierate 
may  be  sliown  to  the  door  by  those  wlio  have  been 
weak  enough  to  admit  him.  He  is  a  mere  pompous 
impostor.  At  most  and  best,  recMptrate  means  re- 
cover ;  not  a  jot  more  or  less.  liecover  came  to  us 
English  through  our  Norman  -  French  kinsfolk,  and 
sometime  conquerors.  It  is  merely  their  recouvrer 
domesticated  in  our  household.  They  got  it  from 
the  Latin  recuperare.  But  why  we  should  go  to  that 
word  to  make  another  from  it,  which  is  simply  a 
travesty  of  recover,  passes  reasonable  understanding. 
But  I  must  have  done  with  such  minute  and  particu- 
lar criticism  of  verbal  extravagance,  having  written 
thus  much  only  by  way  of  suggestion,  remonstrance, 
and  illustration.  It  would  be  well  if  all  such  words 
as  those  of  which  I  have  just  treated  could  be  gath- 
ered under  one  head,  to  be  struck  off  at  a  blow  by 
those  who  would  like  to  execute  justice  on  them. 

Jew.  —  A  noteworthy  objection  has  been  made  of 
late  years  by  Jews  to  the  common  use  of  this  desig- 
nation. I  remember  two  instances,  in  one  of  which 
the  "  Pall  Mall  Gazette "  of  London,  and  in  the 
other  the  "  New  York  Times,"  was  taken  to  task  for 
mentioning  that  certain  criminals  were  Jews.  In 
each  case  the  same  question  was  asked,  in  effect  if 
not  in  words,  Would  you  speak  of  the  arrest  of  two 
Episcopalians,  a  Puseyite,  three  Presbyterians,  and 
a  Baptist  ?  and  in  each  case  there  was  an  apology 
made,  and  a  promise  given  that  the  "  offence  "  should 
not  be  repeated.  What  offence  could  be  reasonably 
taken  at  this  designation,  it  would  be  difficult  to 
discover.      The  Jews  are  a  peculiar  people,  who,  in 


116  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

virtue  of  that  strongly  marked  and  exclusive  national- 
ity which  they  so  religiously  cherish,  have  outlived 
the  Pharaohs  who  oppressed  them,  and  who  seem 
likely  to  outlive  the  Pyramids  on  which  they  labored. 
And  when  they  are  mentioned  as  Jews,  no  allusion  is 
meant  or  made  to  their  faith,  but  to  their  race.  A 
parallel  case  to  those  complained  of  would  be  the 
saying  that  a  Frenchman  or  a  Spaniard  had  commit- 
ted a  crime,  at  which  no  offence  is  ever  taken.  A 
Jew  is  a  Jew,  whether  he  holds  to  the  faith  of  his 
fathers  or  leaves  it  for  that  of  Christ  or  of  Moham- 
med. The  complaint  rests  on  a  confusion  of  the 
distinctions  of  race  with  those  of  religion,  owing  to 
the  fact  that  in  this  case  the  boundaries  of  the  race 
and  the  religion  are  almost  identical.  But  it  is  none 
the  less  confusion. 

Jewelry,  as  applied  to  trinkets  and  precious  stones, 
means  properly  jewels  in  general,  not  any  particular 
jewels.  Its  use  in  the  latter  sense  is  of  very  low  caste. 
Think  of  Cornelia  pointing  to  the  Gracchi  and  saying, 
"These  are  my  jewehy  ;^^  or  read  thus  a  grand  pas- 
sage in  the  last  of  the  Hebrew  prophets  :  "  And  they 
shall  be  mine,  said  the  Lord  of  Hosts,  in  that  day 
when  I  make  up  my  jewelry  f  "  The  word  is  of  very 
late  introduction,  not  being  in  Shakespeare,  the  Bible, 
Milton,  or  Johnson's  Dictionary.  Richardson's  earliest 
authority  for  it  is  Burke,  who  speaks  of  "  the  jewelry 
and  goods  of  India,"  where  the  two  nouns  are  happily 
conjoined.  Yor  jewelry,  like  goods,  is  a  general  and 
somewhat  abstract  term ;  and  the  frequent  misappli- 
cation of  the  former  to  particular  articles  of  ornament 
is  akin  to  that  of  the  latter  to  particular  articles  of 
dress,  which  is  pointed  out  on  page  128.  So  Burke 
might  well  have  spoken  of  the  spicery  of  India,  but 


MISUSED   WORDS  117 

o£  the  spices,  not  the  spicery,  in  a  pudding.  Jewelry 
is  the  most  important  department  at  Tiffany's,  but  the 
necklace,  brooch,  and  earrings  that  a  lady  is  wearing 
are  not  her  jewelry,  but  her  jewels.  In  brief,  such 
words  as  spice  and  spicery,  jewels  and  jewelry  are  not 
synonyms.  They  distinguish  the  particular  from  the 
general. 

The  termination  ry,  ary,  or  ery  is  of  heterogeneous 
origin  and  of  various  and  not  easily  determinable 
meaning.  But  neither  its  history  nor  its  meaning  is 
to  our  present  purpose  ;  and  of  the  words  which  have 
this  ending  we  are  concerned  only  with  a  class  of 
about  fifty  nouns  which  express  primarily  place,  or 
condition,  which  is  moral  place.  Such  are  belfry, 
library,  bcikery,  slavery,  beggary  and  the  like.  To 
this  class  jewelry  belongs  in  one  of  its  senses,  which 
may  be  that  in  which  it  was  first  used.  For  the  same 
or  a  similar  difference  obtains  between  jewelry,  jewels 
in  general,  and  jeweb'y,  a  place  for  jewels,  that  there  is 
between  surgery,  an  art,  and  surgery,  a  place  where 
the  art  is  practised  ;  battery,  the  act  of  battering,  and 
battery,  a  collection  of  battering  engines  ;  gentry,  the 
condition  of  gentleness  in  blood,  and  gentry,  those 
who  are  in  that  condition  ;  pioultry,  fowls  in  general, 
and  poultry,  the  place  where  fowls  are  kept  or  sold. 
In  which  sense  jewelry  was  first  used  is  not  known  ; 
but  as  pastry,  confectionery,  and  slirubbery  were  first 
used  to  express  the  place,  the  locus  in  quo  of  paste, 
confections,  and  shrubs,  a  like  origin  of  jewelry  is 
probable.  This  supposition  receives  support  from  the 
fact  that  the  old  French  word  joyaulrie  was  defined 
by  Cotgrave,  A.  D.  1611,  only  as  "the  trade  and  mys- 
tery of  jewelling."  As  jeirelry  is  but  an  Anglicized 
form  oi  joyaulrie,  it  seems  likely  that  the  former  was 


118  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

brought  In  by  the  jewellers  themselves  ;  and  that 
when  written  shop-signs  took  the  place  of  symbols, 
jeivelry  was  so  used,  meaning  at  first  the  art  and  mys- 
tery (as  such  words  on  signs  do  often  nowadays), 
but  afterward  by  natural  transition,  a  place  where  the 
art  was  practised  and  its  productions  were  stored. 
Thence  the  transition  would  be  natural  to  the  mean- 
ing, a  miscellaneous  collection  of  such  productions,  or 
jewels  in  general,  which,  and  not  particular  jewels, 
seems  clearly  to  be  its  proper  meaning.  So  we  wear 
and  use  arms ;  but  a  place  where  arms  are  kept,  and 
a  collection  of  arms  or  arms  in  general,  we  call  an 
armory. 

Kinsman.  —  For  this  hearty  English  word,  full  of 
manhood  and  warm  blood,  elegant  people  have  forced 
upon  us  two  very  vague,  misty  substitutes  —  relation 
and  connection.  By  the  use  of  the  latter  words  in 
place  of  the  former,  nothing  is  gained  and  much  is 
lost.  Both  of  them  are  very  general  terms.  Men 
have  relations  of  various  kinds,  and  connections  are 
of  still  wider  distribution.  Even  in  regard  to  family 
and  friends,  it  is  impossible  to  give  these  words  exact- 
ness of  meaning ;  whereas  a  man's  kin,  his  kinsmen, 
are  only  those  of  his  own  blood.  His  cousin  is  his 
kinsman,  but  his  brother-in-law  is  not.  Yet  relation  is 
made  to  express  both  connections,  one  of  blood,  and 
the  other  of  law.  In  losing  kinsman  we  lose  also  his 
frank,  sweet-lipped  sister,  kinswoman^  and  are  obliged 
to  give  her  place  to  that  poor,  mealy-mouthed,  ill- 
made-up  Latin  interloper,  yemw/e  relation. 

Leave.  —  This  verb  is  very  commonly  ill  used  by 
being  left  without  an  object.  Thus :  Jones  left  this 
morning ;  I  shall  leave  this  evening.  Left  what  ? 
shall  leave  what  ?     Not  the  morning  or  the  evening, 


MISUSED  WORDS  119 

but  home,  town,  or  country.  When  this  verb  is  used, 
the  mention  of  the  place  referred  to  is  absokitely 
necessary.  To  wind  up  a  story  with,  "  Then  he  left," 
is  as  bad  as  to  say,  then  he  sloped  —  worse,  for  sloped 
is  recognized  slang. 

Lie,  Lay.  —  There  is  the  same  difference  between 
these  two  verbs  that  there  is  between  sit  and  set.  The 
difficulty  which  many  persons  find  in  using  them  cor- 
rectly will  be  removed  by  remembering  that  lay  means 
transitive  action,  and  /ie,  rest.  This  difference  be- 
tween the  words  existed  in  the  Anglo-Saxon  stage  of 
our  language  ;  lay  being  merely  the  modern  form  of 
lecgaji,  to  put  down,  to  cause  to  lie  down,  and  so,  to 
kill,  —  in  Latin,  deponere,  occidere,  —  and  lie  the 
modern  form  of  licgan,  to  extend  along,  to  repose  — 
in  Latin,  occunihere.  Lie  is  rarely  used  instead  of  lay^ 
but  the  latter  is  often  incorrectly  substituted  for  the 
former.  Many  persons  will  say,  I  was  laying  (lying) 
down  for  a  nap  ;  very  few,  She  was  lying  (laying) 
down  her  shawl;  or,  He  was  lying  down  the  law. 
The  frequent  confusion  of  the  two  verbs  in  this  re- 
spect is  strange ;  for  almost  every  one  of  us  heard 
them  rightly  used  from  the  time  when  he  lay  at  his 
mother's  breast  and  until  he  outgrew  the  sweet  privi- 
lege of  lying  in  the  twilight  and  hearing  her  voice 
mingle  with  his  fading  consciousness. 

"  Hush,  my  babe,  lie  still  and  slumber." 
"  Now  I  lay  me  down  to  sleep." 

The  tendency  to  the  confusion  of  the  two  verbs  may 
be  partly  due  to  the  fact  that  the  preterite  of  lie  is 
lay. 

"  In  the  slumbers  of  midnight  the  sailor  boy  lay  ;  " 

and  that  this  expression  of  the  most  perfect  rest  is 
identical  in  sound  with  the  expression  of  the  most 
violent  action. 


120  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

"  Lay  on,  Macduff, 
And  damn'd  be  he  who  first  cries,  Hold,  enough !  " 

Even  Byron  uses  lay  incorrectly  in  "  Childe  Harold.'* 

"  And  dashest  him  again  to  earth  —  there  let  him  lay." 

The  keeping  in  mind  the  distinction  that  lay  ex- 
presses transitive  action,  and  lie  rest,  as  is  shown  in 
the  following  examples,  will  prevent  all  confusion  of 
the  two :  — 

I  lay  myself  upon  the  bed  (action).  I  lie  upon  the 
bed  (rest). 

I  laid  myself  upon  the  bed  (action).  I  lay  upon 
the  bed  (rest). 

I  have  laid  myself  upon  the  bed  (action).  I  have 
lain  upon  the  bed  (rest). 

A  hen  lays  an  egg  (action).  A  ship  lies  at  the 
wharf  (rest).  The  murdered  Lincoln  lay  in  state 
(rest)  ;  the  people  laid  the  crime  upon  the  rebels 
(action). 

The  need  there  is  for  these  remarks  could  not  be 
better  shewn  than  by  the  following  ludicrous  passages 
in  the  Rules  of  the  Senate  and  the  Rules  of  the  House 
of  Representatives  of  the  United  States  :  — 

"  When  a  question  is  under  debate,  no  motion  shall  be  re- 
ceived but  to  adjourn,  to  lie  on  the  table,  to  postpone  indefi- 
nitely," etc.  —  Senate  Rule  11. 

"  When  a  question  is  under  debate,  no  motion  shall  be  received 
but  to  adjourn,  to  lie  on  the  table,  for  the  previous  question,"  etc. 
—  House  Rule  42. 

And  so  it  is  all  through  the  Manual.  Now,  con- 
sidering the  condition  in  which  honorable  gentlemen 
sometimes  appear  on  the  floor,  if  the  rule  had  been 
"  No  motion  shall  be  received  but  to  lie  under  the 
table,"  the  Manual  would,  in  this  respect,  have  been 
beyond  censure.     The  correct  uses  of  lie  and  lay  are 


MISUSED   WORDS  121 

finely  discriminated  in  the  following  passages  from 
the  Book  of  Ruth,  one  of  the  most  beautiful  and  care- 
fully written  in  our  translation  of  the  Bible  :  — 

"  And  it  shall  be  that  when  he  lieth  down,  that  thou  shalt  mark 
the  place  where  he  shall  lie  ;  and  thou  shalt  go  in  and  uncover 
his  feet  and  lay  thee  down.  And  when  Boaz  had  eaten  and 
drunk,  and  his  heart  was  merry,  he  went  to  lie  down  at  the  end 
of  the  heap  of  corn,  and  she  came  softly  and  uncovered  his  feet 
and  laid  her  down  .  .  .  and  behold  a  woman  lay  at  his  feet  .  .  . 
lie  down  until  the  morning.  And  she  lay  at  his  feet  until  the 
morning."  —  ch.  iii.  4,  7,  13,  14. 

Like,  As.  —  The  confusion  of  these  two  words, 
which  are  of  like  meaning,  but  have  different  func- 
tions, produces  obscurity  in  the  writing  even  of  men 
who  have  been  well  educated.  Of  this  I  find  an  in- 
structive and  characteristic  example  in  a  London 
paper  of  high  standing  —  "  The  Spectator."  In  an 
article  supporting  a  remonstrance  of  the  London  gas- 
stokers  against  being  compelled  to  work  twelve  hours 
a  day  for  seven  days  of  the  week  before  huge  fires  in 
a  temperature  often  of  one  hundred  and  eighty  de- 
grees, the  writer,  deprecating  a  strike  by  the  stokers, 
goes  on  to  say,  "  The  Directors  could  fill  their  places 
in  three  hours  from  the  docks  alone ;  but  that  does 
not  give  them  a  right  to  use  up  Englishmen  like 
Cuban  planters."  But  how  have  directors  of  British 
gas  companies  the  right  to  use  up  Cuban  planters  ? 
and  how  could  they  use  up  Cuban  planters  ?  There 
are  no  answers  to  these  inevitable  questions,  and  the 
sentence  as  it  stands  is  sheer  nonsense.  But  a  little 
thought  discovers  that  what  the  writer  meant  to  say 
was,  that  the  directors  had  no  right  to  use  up  English- 
men as  Cuban  planters  use  up  negroes.  His  niean- 
insrless  sentence  was  the  result  of  the  confusion  of 


122  WORDS  AND   THEIR   USES 

Wee  and  as,  which  is  common  with  careless  speakers. 
Thus,  for  instance,  He  don't  do  it  like  you  do,  instead 
of  as  you  do.  Like  and  as  both  express  similarity, 
but  the  former  compares  things,  the  latter  action  or 
existence.  We  may  say  correctly,  John  is  like  James, 
and  may  express  the  same  opinion  by  saying  that 
John  is  such  a  man  as  James  is.  We  may  say,  A's 
speech  is  like  B's,  or,  A  speaks  as  B  does  ;  but  not 
A's  speech  is  as  B's,  or,  A  speaks  like  B  does.  When 
as  is  correctly  used,  a  verb  is  expressed  or  under- 
stood. The  woman  is  as  tall  as  the  man,  i.  e.,  as  the 
man  is.  With  lihe^  a  verb  is  neither  expressed  nor 
understood.  He  does  his  work  like  a  man  ;  not,  like 
a  man  works. 

Loan  is  not  a  verb,  but  a  noun.  A  loan  is  the 
completed  act  of  lending,  or  is  the  thing  lent.  The 
word  is  the  past  participle  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  verb 
Icenan,  to  lend,  and  therefore  of  course  means  lent. 
It  may  sound  larger  to  some  people  to  say  that  they 
loaned  than  that  they  lent  a  thousand  dollars  —  more 
as  if  the  loan  were  an  important  transaction  ;  but  that 
can  be  only  because  they  are  either  ignorant  or  snob- 
bish. 

Locate  is  a  common  Americanism,  insufferable  to 
ears  at  all  sensitive.  If  a  gentleman  chooses  to  say, 
"  I  guess  I  shall  locate  in  Muzzouruh,"  meaning  that 
he  thinks  he  shall  settle  in  Missouri,  he  has,  doubtless, 
the  right,  as  a  free  and  independent  citizen  of  the 
United  States,  to  say  so.  Certainly  locate  and  ^fvz- 
zouruh  should  be  left  together ;  each  in  fit  company. 
Locate  is  simply  a  big  word  for  place  or  settle  ;  and 
a  man  for  whom  those  words  are  not  ample  enough, 
may  correctly  speak  of  locating  himself,  his  family,  or 
his  business  here   or  elsewhere.     But  locate  without 


MISUSED  \\'ORDS  123 

an  object  is  suited  to  the  use  of  those  only  M^ho  are 
too  ignorant  and  too  restless  to  settle  anywhere. 

Love  and  Like  are  now  confused  by  many  speak- 
ers, and  even  by  some  writers  of  education  and  repute. 
Love  is  often  used  for  like  ;  the  latter  not  so  often 
for  the  former.  Both  words  express  a  pleasure  in 
and  a  desire  for  the  object  to  which  they  are  applied ; 
but  love  expresses  this  and  something  more  —  a  de- 
votion to  it,  an  absorption  in  it,  a  readiness  for  sac- 
rifice to  obtain  or  to  serve  the  beloved  object.  A 
man  loves  his  children,  his  mother,  his  wife,  his  mis- 
tress, the  truth,  his  country.  But  some  men  speak  of 
loving  green  peas  or  apple  pie,  meaning  that  they 
have  a  liking  for  them.  The  distinction  between  the 
two  words  existed  in  the  Anglo-Saxon  stage  of  our  lan- 
guage, and  is  one  of  great  value,  as  it  enables  us  to 
discriminate  between  a  higher  and  lower  preference, 
which  differ  in  kind  as  well  as  in  degree.  It  gives  us 
an  advantage  over  the  French,  for  instance,  who  are 
obliged  to  use  the  same  word  to  express  their  affec- 
tion for  La  France  and  for  meringues  a  la  creme. 
We  shall  have  deteriorated,  as  well  as  our  language, 
when  we  no  longer  distinguish  our  liking  from  our 
loving. 

Manufacturer  is  another  one  of  the  big  words 
that  are  now  applied  to  little  things.  The  village 
shoemaker  is  disappearing,  and  shoes  are  made  by  the 
hundred  —  not  nearly  so  well  as  he  used  to  make  them 
—  by  machinery  in  large  factories,  which  have  come 
to  be  called  manufactories,  although  manufacture  is 
making  by  the  hand.  But  although  boots  are  going 
out  of  fashion,  one  does  not  see  a  little  shoe-shop  with- 
out the  sign  Boot  Manufactory,  and  the  condescending 
announcement.  Repairing  done  with  despatch  —  mean- 


124  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

ing  that  there  shoes  are  made  and  mended.  It  would 
be  well,  on  the  score  of  comfort  as  well  as  of  taste,  if 
there  were  a  little  more  of  the  old  skill  in  the  gentle 
craft,  and  a  little  less  magniloquence.  But  all  this  is 
a  concomitant  of  "  progress,"  and  may  be  borne  with 
equanimity  if  the  boot  manufacturer  and  repairer  is  a 
worthier  and  a  happier  man  than  the  old  shoemaker 
and  mender. 

Marry.  —  There  has  been  not  a  little  discussion  as 
to  the  use  of  this  word,  chiefly  in  regard  to  public 
announcements  of  marriage.  The  usual  mode  of 
making  the  announcement  is  —  Married,  John  Smith 
to  Mary  Jones.  Some  people  having  been  dissatisfied 
with  this  form,  we  have  seen,  of  late  years,  in  certain 
quarters  —  Married,  John  Smith  with  Mary  Jones ; 
and  in  others  —  John  Smith  and  Mary  Jones.  I 
have  no  hesitation  in  saying  that  all  of  these  forms 
are  incorrect.  We  know,  indeed,  what  is  meant  by 
any  one  of  them  ;  but  the  same  is  true  of  hundreds 
and  thousands  of  erroneous  uses  of  language.  Pro- 
perly speaking,  a  man  is  not  married  to  a  woman,  or 
married  with  her ;  nor  are  a  man  and  a  woman  married 
with  each  other.  The  woman  is  married  to  the  man. 
It  is  her  name  that  is  lost  in  his,  not  his  in  hers  ;  she 
becomes  a  member  of  his  family,  not  he  of  hers  ;  it  is 
her  life: that  is  merged,  or  supposed  to  be  merged, 
in  his,  not  his  in  hers  ;  she  follows  his  fortunes,  and 
takes  his  station,  not  he  hers.  And  thus,  manifestly, 
she  has  been  attached  to  him  by  a  legal  bond,  not  he 
to  her  ;  except,  indeed,  as  all  attachment  is  necessarily 
mutual.  But,  nevertheless,  we  do  not  speak  of  tying 
a  ship  to  a  boat,  but  a  boat  to  a  ship.  And  so  long, 
at  least,  as  man  is  the  larger,  the  stronger,  the  more 
individually  important,  as  long  as  woman  generally 


MISUSED    WORDS  125 

lives  in  her  husband's  house  and  bears  his  name, — 
still  more  should  she  not  bear  his  name,  —  it  is  the 
woman  who  is  married  to  the  man.  "  Nubo  :  viro 
trador :  to  be  married  to  a  man.  For  it  is  in  the 
woman's  part  only."  Lilly'' s  Grammar.  —  In  speak- 
ing of  the  ceremony  it  is  proper  to  say  that  he  married 
her  (duxit  in  matrimonio)^  and  not  that  she  married 
him,  but  that  she  was  married  to  him  ;  and  the  proper 
form  of  announcement  is  —  Married,  Mary  Jones  to 
John  Smith.  The  etymology  of  the  word  agrees 
entirely  with  the  conditions  of  the  act  which  it  ex- 
presses. To  marry  is  to  give,  or  to  be  given,  to  a 
husband,  mari. 

Militate  is  rarely  misused,  except  that  any  use  of 
it  is  misuse,  and  it  belongs  rather  among  words  which 
are  not  words.  It  does  not  appear  in  Johnson's  Dic- 
tionary, and  it  is  of  comparatively  recent  introduction. 
But  it  must  have  been  creeping  into  newspaper  use  in 
Johnson's  day,  as  it  occurs  in  the  following  sentence 
of  a  passage  quoted  in  the  "  Pall  Mall  Gazette,"  from 
the  "  St.  James's  Chronicle,"  of  more  than  ninety 
years  ago :  — 

"On  Saturday,  the  Exhibition  of  the  Royal  Academy  was 
opened  for  the  first  time,  at  the  great  room  in  Pall  Mall.  We 
are  sorry  to  observe  that  though  this  institution  has  successfully 
militated  against  all  others,  and  nearly  swallowed  them  up,  it 
seems  to  be  on  the  decline." 

What  could  be  more  absurd  than  the  making  of 
the  Latin  milito  into  an  English  word  to  take  the 
place  of  oppose.,  contend,  he  at  variance  with,  as,  for 
instance,  in  the  following  extract  from  a  report  of  the 
murder  of  a  young  lady  in  Virginia :  — 

"  It  was  at  first  supposed  that  the  lady  had  been  thrown  from 
her  horse,  and  killed  by  being  dragged  along  the  grouud.  Sev- 
eral circumstances,  however,  militate  against  this  supposition." 


126  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

The  absurdity  is  the  greater  because  it  is  usually  a 
supposition,  or  a  theory,  or  somethmg  quite  as  incor- 
poreal, that  is  militated  against.  The  use  of  this 
word  is,  however,  not  a  question  of  right  or  wrong, 
but  one  of  taste.  It  belongs  to  a  bad  family,  of  which 
are  necessitate,  ratiocinate,  effectuate,  and  eventuate, 
which,  with  their  substantives,  —  necessitation,  ratio- 
cination, effectuation,  and  eventuation  (which  must 
be  received  with  their  parent  verbs),  —  should  not  be 
recognized  as  members  of  good  English  society.  It 
is  well  in  keeping  for  negro  minstrels,  in  announcing 
their  performances,  to  say,  "  The  felicity  will  eventu- 
ate every  evening." 

Obnoxious.  —  It  were  well  if  this  word  had  stopped 
short  of,  its  last  deflected  meaning.  An  Anglicized 
form  of  the  Latin  ohjicxius,  its  root  is  the  verb  noceo, 
to  harm,  hence  noxius,  harmful,  and  therefore  obnox- 
ious means  liable  or  exposed  to  harm.  Until  the 
close  of  the  last  century  it  was  used  in  this  sense  only, 
as  may  be  seen  by  reference  to  Richardson's  Diction- 
ary. Milton  wrote  in  "  Samson  Agonistes  "  "  obnox- 
ious more  to  all  the  miseries  of  life,"  and  Dr.  Arm- 
strong, in  his  "  Art  of  Preserving  Health,"  "  to  change 
obnoxious."  But  as  a  person  who  is  obnoxious  to 
punishment  is  supposed  to  be  blameable,  and  as  we 
affect  that  a  blameable  person  is  an  offensive  one,  it 
has  come  to  be  used  in  the  sense  of  offensive,  particu- 
larly by  those  who  do  not  know  exactly  what  it  does 
mean.  We  do  not  need  both  offensive  and  obnoxious, 
with  but  one  meaning  between  them  ;  but  perhaps  it 
is  too  much  to  hope  that  we  may  retain  both,  and  re- 
store to  obnoxious  its  proper  and  useful  signification. 

Observe.  —  This  word,  the  primary  meaning  of 
which  is  to  keep  carefully,  and  hence  to  heed,  has  by 


MISUSED   WORDS  127 

an  orderly  and  consistent  deflection  come  to  mean 
also  to  keep  in  view,  to  follow  with  respect  and  defer- 
ence, e.  r/.,  "  and  let  thine  eyes  observe  my  ways," 
and  to  fulfil  and  attend  to  with  religious  care,  as  to 
observe  one's  duties,  to  observe  the  Sabbath.  But  it 
is  frequently  used  as  a  mere  synonym  of  say.  This 
sense  is  not  a  derived  or  deflected  sense,  but  an  extra- 
neous one  imposed  upon  the  word  by  loose  usage.  It 
is  reached  by  uniting  to  the  sense  of  heeding  or  re- 
marking, that  of  expressing  what  is  remarked,  and 
then  dropping  the  essential  meaning  of  the  word  in 
favor  of  that  which  has  been  imposed  upon  it.  Used 
to  mean  heed,  take  note  of,  keep  in  view,  follow,  attend 
to,  fulfil,  it  does  good  service.  But  in  the  sense  of 
say,  as,  I  observed  to  him  so  and  so,  for,  I  said  so  and 
so  to  him,  or.  What  did  you  observe  ?  for,  What  did 
you  say  ?  it  might  better  be  left  to  people  who  must 
be  very  elegant  and  exquisite  in  their  speaking. 

Partially  is  often  used,  and  by  educated  peo- 
ple, for  jpartly.  Even  Mr.  Swinburne  says,  in  his 
interesting  but  somewhat  strained  and  overwrought 
book  on  William  Blake,  "  If  this  view  of  the  poem 
be  wholly  or  partially  correct."  But  'partially.,  the 
adverb  oi  pai'tial,  means  with  unjust  or  unreasonable 
bias.  A  view  cannot  be  both  coi-rect  and  partial. 
When  anything  is  done  in  part,  it  is  partly,  not  par- 
tially, done.  Both  words  are  from  one  root ;  but  to 
confuse  the  two  is  to  deprive  us  of  the  use  of  one. 

Partook.  —  Say,  that  you  ate  your  breakfast  or 
your  dinner,  not  that  you  partook  of  some  rolls  and 
butter  and  cofPee,  or  of  beef  and  pudding.  Although, 
if  you  are  at  breakfast  when  a  friend  comes  in,  you 
may  ask  him,  if  you  like  the  phrase,  to  sit  down  and 
partake  of  it,  i.  e.,  take  a  part  of  it,  share  it  with 
you. 


128  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

Party,  Article,  Goods.  —  These  shop  words 
should,  in  their  shop  sense,  be  left  in  the  shop.  Mr. 
Bullions  in  making  a  contract  or  going  into  an  "  op- 
eration," is  a  pai'ty  ;  but  in  his  house  or  yours  he  is 
a  person.  Mrs.  Bullions's  Sevres  vase,  being  on  her 
cabinet,  is  no  longer  an  elegant  article,  but  a  vase, 
more  or  less  beautiful ;  and  the  material  of  her  gown, 
having  been  honored  by  her  possession,  and  shaped 
by  her  figure,  is  no  longer  goods.  Mr.  Sheldon's 
books,  Mr.  Low's  tea,  Mr.  Stewart's  silk,  are  their 
goods ;  but  we  neither  read  goods,  nor  drink  goods  ; 
how,  then,  do  we  wear  goods  ?  Yet  some  people, 
and  even  women  of  some  cultivation,  —  they  who  so 
rarely  ei-r  in  language,  —  will  speak  of  the  materials 
of  their  garments  as  goods.  Goods  means  articles 
of  personal  property,  regarded  as  property,  not  as 
personal  appendages.  Houses  and  lands  are  good, 
but  not  goods  ;  nor  are  ships ;  but  the  cotton  and  the 
corn  in  the  ships  are  goods :  a  stock  in  trade  is  goods  ; 
but  a  man's  household  gods  are  not  his  goods  until  he 
puts  them  into  the  market.  And  so  Mrs.  Bullions, 
when  she  is  sold  out,  may  rightly  enumerate  her  gown 
among  her  goods,  and  her  Sevres  vase  among  her 
"  articles  of  bigotry  and  virtue." 

Patron.  —  If  you  are  in  retail  trade,  don't  call 
your  customers  your  patrons,  and  send  them  circulars 
asking  for  a  continuance  of  their  patronage  ;  unless 
you  mean  to  say  that  they  buy  of  you,  not  because 
they  need  what  you  have  to  sell,  but  merely  to  give 
you  money,  and  that  you  are  a  dependant  upon  their 
favor.  There  is  patronage  in  this  country,  both 
within  and  without  the  administration  of  govern- 
ment ;  and  it  does  not  imply  loss  of  independence  on 
the  one  side  or  arrogance  on  the  other ;  but  it  does  not 


MISUSED   WORDS  129 

consist  in  buying  what  one  needs  for  one's  own  com- 
fort or  pleasure. 

Pell  -  mell.  —  This  word  or  phrase  implies  a 
crowd  and  confusion  (Fr.  melee),  and  should  never 
be  applied,  as  it  is  by  some  speakers  and  some  writers 
for  the  press,  to  an  individual ;  as,  for  instance,  in 
this  sentence  from  a  first-rate  newspaper  :  "  I  rushed 
pell-mell  out  of  the  theatre."  The  writer  might  as 
well  have  said  that  he  rushed  out  promiscuously,  or 
that  he  marched  out  by  platoons. 

Persuaded.  —  The  use  of  this  participle  in  the 
sense  of  convinced,  cannot,  I  think,  be  justly  con- 
demned as  vulgar  or  a  solecism.  The  best  usage 
is  too  strongly  in  its  favor.  "All  the  people  will 
stone  us,  for  they  be  persuaded  that  John  was  a  pro- 
pliet."  (Luke  xx.  6.)  "  I  am  persuaded  that  none 
of  these  things  were  hidden  from  him  ;  for  this  thing 
was  not  done  in  a  corner."  (Acts  xxvi.  26.)  "  This 
is  the  monkey's  own  giving  out.  She  is  persuaded 
I  will  marry  her  out  of  her  own  love  and  flattery,  not 
out  of  my  promise."  (Othello  iv.  1.)  Nevertheless 
its  use  in  this  sense  is  a  loss  to  the  language.  It 
deprives  us  of  a  word  which  expresses  the  result  of 
influences  gentler  than  those  that  produce  conviction. 
A  man  is  sometimes  persuaded  to  act  against  his  con- 
viction. The  root  of  the  Latin  word  suadeo,  from 
which  the  verb  'persuade  is  derived,  has  in  it  a  sug- 
gestion of  sweetness  {stiavis,  sweet),  hinting  gentle- 
ness and  allurement.  Suavium  means  a  sweet  mouth, 
and  so,  a  kiss.  Women  jiersuade  when  they  cannot 
convince.  It  would  be  well  if  this  tender  and  deli- 
cate sense  of  the  word  could  be  preserved. 

Portion   is   commonly  misused   in   the    sense   of 
^art.     For  instance ;    "A  large   portion  of  Broad- 


130  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

way  is  impassable  for  carriages,  on  account  of  the 
snow  and  ice."  A  correct  speaker  would  say,  "A 
large  part  of  Broadway,"  etc.  A  portion  is  a  part 
set  aside  for  a  special  purpose,  or  to  be  considered 
by  itself. 

Predicate.  —  Should  I  express  to  my  own  satis- 
faction the  feeling  which  the  frequent  misuse  of  this 
word  by  people  who  use  it  because  they  do  not  know 
its  meaning,  excites  in  the  bosoms  of  those  who  do 
know,  and  who,  therefore,  use  it  rarely,  I  might  pro- 
voke a  smile  from  my  readers,  and  I  certainly  should 
smile  at  myself.  If  there  is  one  verbal  offence  which 
more  than  any  other  justifies  an  open  expression  of 
contempt,  it  is  when  an  honorable  gentleman  rises  in 
his  place  and  asks  whether  the  honorable  body  of 
which  he  is  a  member  "  intends  to  predicate  any  action 
upon  the  statement  of  the  honorable  gentleman  who 
has  just  sat  down ;  "  what  he  wishes  to  know  being,  if 
they  mean  to  do  anything  or  to  take  any  steps  about 
it,  or  found  any  action  upon  it.  And  so  a  well- 
known  member  of  Congress  addressed  a  letter  to  the 
New  York  "  Times  "  in  which  he  said,  "  You  predi- 
cate an  editorial  on  a  wrong  report  of  my  speech  in 
Brooklyn."  Yet,  perhaps,  such  a  man  does  not  for- 
feit all  the  consideration  due  to  a  vertebrate  animal. 
Predicate  means  primarily  to  speak  before,  and, 
hence,  to  bear  witness,  to  affirm,  to  declare.  So  the 
Germans  call  their  clergymen  predicants,  because 
they  bear  witness  to  and  declare  the  gospel.  But  in 
English,  predicate  is  a  technical  word  used  by  gram- 
marians to  express  that  element  of  the  sentence  which 
affirms  something  of  the  subject,  or  (as  a  noun)  that 
which  is  affirmed.  And  thus  action  may  be  predi- 
cated of  a  body  or  an  individual ;   but  action  predi- 


MISUSED   WORDS  131 

cated  hy  a  body  upon  circumstances  or  statements,  is 
simple  absurdity.  Those  persons  for  whom  this  dis- 
tinction is  too  subtle  had  better  confine  themselves  to 
plain  English,  and  ask,  What  are  you  going  to  do 
about  it?  —  language  good  enough  for  a  chief  justice 
or  a  prime  minister. 

Present.  —  The  use  of  this  word  for  introduce  is 
an  affectation.  Persons  of  a  certain  rank  in  Europe 
are  presented  at  court ;  and  the  craving  of  every  item 
of  the  sovereign  people  of  this  democratic  republic  to 
be  presented  at  the  Tuileries  affords  one  of  the  great- 
est charms  of  the  life  of  our  minister  resident  near 
that  court,  and  is  the  chief  solace  of  his  diplomatic 
labors.  In  France  every  person,  in  being  made  ac- 
quainted with  another,  is  j^resented,  the  French  lan- 
guage not  having  made  the  distinction  which  is  made 
in  England  between  ^jresen^  and  inti-oduce.  We  jjre- 
sent  foreign  ministers  to  the  President ;  we  introduce, 
or  should  introduce,  our  friends  to  each  other.  We 
introduce  the  younger  to  the  older,  the  person  of  lower 
position  to  the  person  of  higher,  the  gentleman  to  the 
lady  —  not  the  older  to  the  younger  —  the  lady  to 
the  gentleman.  Yet  some  ladies  will  speak  of  being 
introduced  to  such  and  such  a  gentleman.  Is  this  a 
revolutionary  intimation  that  they  set  nothing  by  the 
deference  which  man  in  his  strength  and  mastery  and 
sexual  independence  pays  to  their  weakness,  their 
charms,  and  their  actual  or  probable  motherhood  ? 

Quite  means  completely,  entirely,  in  a  finished 
manner.  It  is  from  the  French  quitte,  discharged,  and 
is  akin  to  quits^  the  word  used  by  players  of  games  to 
mean  that  they  are  even  with  each  other.  Therefore 
the  common  phrase,  miscalled  an  Americanism,  quite 
a  number^  is  unjustifiable.     A  cup  or  a  theatre  may 


132  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

be  quite  full ;  and  there  may  be  qyiite  a  pint  in  the 
cup,  or  quite  a  thousand  people  in  the  theatre,  and 
neither  may  be  quite  full.  But  number  is  indefinite 
in  its  signification,  and  therefore  cannot  be  properly 
qualified  by  quite.  Yet  Thomas  Hughes,  whom  we 
all  think  of  as  Tom  Brown,  in  his  letter  about  the  Ox- 
ford and  Harvard  boat  race,  spoke  of  "  quite  a  number 
of  young  Americans." 

Kailroad  Depot  is  the  abominable  name  usually 
given  in  this  country  to  a  railway  station.  In  Eng- 
land they  generally  say  railway  ;  but  some  of  their 
companies  are  styled  Railroad  Companies.  In  Amer- 
ica the  compound  most  in  use  is  railroad^  but  we 
have  the  Erie  Railway  Company,  and  others  of  like 
name.  How  the  difference  came  about  it  would  be 
difficult  to  discover ;  but  railway  is  absolutely  right, 
and  railroad.,  at  least,  measurably  wrong.  A  way  is 
that  which  guides  or  directs  a  course,  or  that  upon 
which  anything  moves  or  is  carried.  Hence,  we  say 
that  a  ship,  when  she  is  launched,  glides  into  the 
water  upon  her  ways.  The  ways  upon  which  a  ship  is 
launched  are  very  like  those  which  guide  railway  car- 
riages, and  which  at  first  were  called  tramways.  A 
road  is  the  ground  ridden  over,  the  land  appropriated 
to  travel,  and  used  as  a  means  of  communication  be- 
tween place  and  place.  A  railwa?/  is  laid  u-pon  a  road^ 
and  the  road  is  always  somewhat,  and  generally  very 
much,  wider  than  the  way.  But  the  calling  a  way  a 
road  is  a  venial  offence  compared  to  that  of  calling  a 
station  a  dejibt.  Every  depot  is  a  station,  although 
not  in  all  cases  a  passenger  or  even  a  freight  station ; 
but  very  few  stations  are  depots.  A  depot  is  a  place 
where  stores  and  materials  are  deposited  for  safe  keep- 
ing.    A  little  lonoiy  shanty,  which  looks  like  a  lodg« 


MISUSED  WORDS  138 

outside  a  garden  of  cucumbers,  a  staging  of  a  few 
planks  upon  which  two  or  three  people  stand  lik« 
criminals  on  the  scaffold  —  to  call  such  places  depots 
is  the  height  of  pretentious  absurdity.  But  it  is  not 
less  incorrect  to  give  the  same  name  to  the  most  impos- 
ing building  which  is  used  merely  as  a  stopping  place 
for  trains  and  passengers.  Station  means  merely  a 
standing,  as  in  the  well-known  passage  in  Hamlet,  — 

"  A  station  like  the  herald  Mercury 
New-lighted  on  a  heaven-kissing  hill," 

and  a  railway  station  is  a  railway  standing  —  a  place 
where  trains  and  passengers  stand  for  each  other. 
There  is  no  justification  whatever  for  calling  such  a 
place  a  depot.  And  to  aggravate  the  offence  of  so 
doing  as  much  as  possible,  the  word  is  pronounced  in 
a  manner  which  is  of  itself  an  affront  to  common  sense 
and  good  taste  —  that  is,  neither  day-poh,  as  it  should 
be  if  it  is  used  as  a  French  word,  nor  dee-pott^  as  it 
should  be  if  it  has  been  adopted  as  an  English  word. 
With  an  affectation  of  French  pronunciation  as  be- 
coming as  a  French  bonnet  or  French  manners  to  some 
of  those  who  wear  them,  it  is  called  dee-poh,  the  result 
being  a  hybrid  English-French  monster,  which,  with 
the  phrase  of  which  it  forms  a  part,  should  be  put  out 
of  existence  with  all  convenient  despatch. 

Real  Estate  is  a  compound  that  has  no  proper 
place  in  the  language  of  every-day  life,  where  it  is 
merely  a  pretentious  intruder  from  the  technical  pro- 
vince of  law.  Law  makes  the  distinction  of  real  and 
personal  estate ;  but  a  man  does  not,  therefore,  talk  of 
drawing  some  personal  estate  from  the  bank,  or  going 
to  Tiffany's  to  buy  some  personal  estate  for  his  wife ; 
nor,  when  he  has  an  interest  in  the  national  debt,  does 
he   ask   how  personal   estate    is   selling.     He  draws 


134  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

money,  buys  jewels,  asks  the  price  of  bonds.  Real 
estate,  as  ordinarily  used,  is  a  mere  big-sounding,  vul- 
gar phrase  for  houses  and  land,  and,  so  used,  is  a 
marked  and  unjustifiable  Americanism.  Our  papers 
have  columns  headed  in  large  letters,  "  Real  Estate 
Transactions,"  the  heading  of  which  should  be  Sales 
of  Land. 

Recollect  is  used  by  many  persons  wrongly  for 
remeTnber.  When  we  do  not  remember  what  we  wish 
to  speak  of,  we  try  to  re-collect  it.  Misrecollect  ap- 
peared in  a  leading  article  in  the  "  Tribune  "  not  long 
ago  —  a  word  hardly  on  a  par  with  Biddy's  disre- 
member.  We  either  can  or  cannot  recollect  what  we 
do  not  at  once  remember.  We  cannot  recollect  amiss, 
unless  it  be  that  we  recollect  the  facts,  but  not  in  their 
proper  order. 

Religion  is  constantly  used  as  if  it  were  a  syno- 
nym of  piety,  to  the  obliteration  of  a  very  important 
distinction  in  ethics,  and  the  consequent  misleading 
of  many  minds.  Religion  is  a  bond,  according  to 
which  all  who  acknowledge  it  assume  the  performance 
of  certain  duties  and  rites  having  relation  to  a  supreme 
being,  or  to  a  future  state  of  existence,  or  to  both. 
Piety  is  that  motive  of  human  action  which  has  its 
spring  in  the  desire  to  do  good,  in  the  reverence 
for  what  is  good,  and  in  the  spontaneous  respect  for 
the  claims  of  kindred  or  gratitude.  There  are  many 
religions :  there  is  but  one  piety.  Judaism  is  a  re- 
ligion ;  Mohammedanism  is  a  religion ;  Christianity 
has  become  a  religion,  within  which  are  three  religions, 
the  Roman,  the  Greek,  and  the  Protestant.  And  as 
to  which  of  all  these  is  the  true  religion,  very  different 
views  are  honestly  held  by  Jews,  Mohammedans,  Ro- 
man Catholics,  and  Protestants,  all  of  whom  may  be 


MISUSED    WORDS  135 

pious  with  the  same  piety.  Socrates  inculcated  piety  ; 
but  when,  on  his  death-bed,  with  his  last  breath,  he 
reminded  his  friend  to  sacrifice  a  cock  to  ^sculapius, 
he  conformed  to  the  rites  of  a  religion  for  attempting- 
to  undermine  which  he  was  put  to  death.  When 
Christ  kept  the  Passover,  he  conformed  to  a  rite  of 
Judaism  into  which  he  had  been  born  and  in  which 
he  had  been  bred.  But  he  was  put  to  death  by  the 
priests  and  the  Pharisees  chiefly  because  he  taught  the 
Heedlessness  of  that  very  religion.  The  Sermon  in 
the  Mount  teaches  not  religion,  but  piety. 

Remit.  —  Why  should  this  word  be  thrust  contin- 
ually into  the  place  of  send?  In  its  proper  sense,  to 
send  back,  and  hence  to  relax,  to  relinquish,  to  sur- 
render, to  forgive,  it  is  a  useful  and  respectable  word  ; 
but  why  one  man  should  say  to  another,  I  will  remit 
you  the  money,  instead  of,  I  will  send  you  the  money, 
it  would  be  difficult  to  say,  did  we  not  so  frequently 
see  the  propensity  of  people  to  use  a  big  word  of 
which  they  do  not  know  the  meaning  exactly,  in  pre- 
ference to  a  small  one  that  they  have  understood 
from  childhood.  This  leads  people,  in  the  present 
instance,  to  speak  even  of  sending  remittances  :  than 
which  it  would  be  hard  to  find  an  absurder  phrase. 
But  it  sounds,  they  think,  much  finer  to  say,  My  cor- 
respondents have  not  sent  the  remittances  I  expected, 
instead  of,  My  fi'iends  have  not  sent  me  the  money  I 
looked  for. 

Restive  means  standing  stubbornly  still,  not  frisky, 
as  some  people  seem  to  think  it  does.  A  restive  horse 
is  a  horse  that  balks  ;  but  horses  that  are  restless  are 
frequently  called  restive.  Restiveness,  however,  is 
one  sign  of  rebellion  in  horses.  Thus  Dryden  (quoted 
\)y  Johnson)  :  — 


136  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

"  The  pampered  colt  will  discipline  disdain, 
Impatient  of  the  lash,  and  restiff  to  the  rein." 

Hence  a  misapprehension,  by  which  those  who  did  not 
understand  the  word  were  led  to  a  complete  reversion 
of  meaning. 

Reverend  and  Honorable.  —  The  editor  of  a 
western  newspaper  has  asked  me  the  following  ques- 
tion :  "  In  speaking  of  a  clergyman  —  not  a  Catholic 
or  an  Episcopalian  —  is  it  proper  to  say  the  Rev.  John 
Jones,  for  instance,  or,  simply.  Rev.  John  Jones  ?  If 
it  is  proper  to  say  the  Rev.  John  Jones,  why  is  it  not 
proper  to  say  the  Captain  Tom  Robinson,  or  the  Gen- 
eral Robert  Smith  ?  " 

The  article  is  absolutely  required.  The  sect  to 
which  the  clergyman  belongs  does  not  affect  the  ques- 
tion. Between  Reverend  and  Captain  or  General 
there  is  no  analogy.  The  latter  are  names  of  offices  ; 
they  are  titles  pertaining  of  right  to  the  persons  who 
hold  those  offices.  Reverend  is  not  the  name  of  an 
office,  nor  is  it  a  title,  and  it  belongs  to  no  one  of 
right.  Clergymen  are  styled  Reverend  by  a  courtesy 
which  supposes  that  every  man  set  apart  for  his  spe- 
cial sanctity  and  wisdom  as  an  example,  a  guide,  and 
an  instructor,  is  worthy  of  reverence.  So  members  of 
Congress  are  styled  Honorable,  but  by  mere  courtesy. 
But  in  Congress  does  a  member  ever  rise  and  say,  "  I 
heartily  agree  with  the  views  which  honorable  gentle- 
man from has  just  laid  before  the  House.  Hon- 
orable gentleman  could  not  have  presented  them  with 
greater  force  or  clearness  "  ?  The  most  unlettered 
and  careless  speaker  in  the  House  of  Representatives 
would  say  the  honorable  gentleman.  Honorable  and 
Reverend  are  not  even  courtesy  titles  ;  they  are  ad- 
jectives, mere  epithets  applied  at  first  (the  one  to  men 


MISUSED    WORDS  137 

of  importance,  and  the  other  to  clergymen)  with  spe- 
cial meaning,  but  afterward  from  custom  only.  The 
impropriety  of  omitting  the  article  can  be  clearly 
shown  by  a  transposition  of  the  epithet  and  the  name, 
which  does  not  affect  the  sense.  For  instance,  Henry 
AVard  Beecher,  the  Reverend  ;  Charles  Sumner,  the 
Honorable ;  not  Henry  ^"ard  Beecher,  Reverend  ; 
Charles  Sumner,  Honorable.  But  the  transposition 
which  has  this  effect  in  the  case  of  epithets  has  none 
in  that  of  official  titles  ;  thus  —  Winfield  Hancock, 
Major-General,  Samuel  Nelson,  Judge ;  which,  indeed, 
are  very  common  modes  of  writing  such  names  and 
titles.  The  omission  of  the  article  has  been  the  cause 
of  a  misapprehension  on  the  part  of  many  persons  as 
to  the  name  of  the  ecclesiastical  historian  to  whom  we 
owe  so  much  of  our  knowledcre  of  our  Anfrlo-Saxon 
forefathers  in  England.  He  was  styled  by  his  succes- 
sors the  Venerable  Bede  ;  but  this  having  been  writ- 
ten in  Latin  YaierahiUs  Beda,  he  has  often  been 
mentioned  by  British  writers  as  Venerable  Bede, 
which  some  readers  have  taken,  as  a  whole,  for  his 
name.  (I  have  more  than  once  heard  the  question 
mooted  among  intelligent  people.)  He  was  merely 
called  Bede,  the  venerable  ;  but  the  Latin  has  no  arti- 
cle ;  and  hence  the  mistake  of  calling  him  Venerable 
Bede.  We  may  correctly  speak  of  a  distinguished 
prelate  who  recently  died  as  Bishop  Hopkins,  as  the 
Right  Reverend  Bishop  Hopkins,  or  as  the  Right  Rev- 
erend John  Heniy  Hopkins,  Bishop  (not  the  Bishop) 
of  Vermont.  But  if  we  speak  of  the  officer  without 
mention  of  the  individual,  even  although  we  give  the 
courtesy  epithet,  we  should  use  the  article  before  the 
title,  as,  the  Right  Reverend  the  Bishop  of  Vermont  j 
and  so,  in  speaking  of  a  military  officer  by  name,  the 


138  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

article  is  not  admissible  ;  but  if  we  speak  of  the  offi^* 
cer  without  mentioning  the  name,  the  article  is  re* 
quired  :  thus,  Major-General  Meade,  Commanding-in- 
Chief,  but,  the  Major-General  Commanding-in-Chief. 

Sample  Room.  —  This  confluent  eruption  has  ap- 
peared on  sign-boards  all  over  New  York  during  the 
last  few  years.  Thus  used  it  means,  not  a  room  in 
which  samples  are  displayed,  but  simply  a  place  at 
which  spirits  and  beer  may  be  drunk  at  a  bar,  and  is 
the  fruit  of  a  nauseous  attempt  to  sweeten  har-room, 
ale-house,  and  tavern.  Its  history  is  a  very  disgusting 
one.  It  first  appeared  in  small,  shame-faced  letters 
over  the  doors  of  partitions  put  up  across  the  back 
part  of  certain  so-called  wholesale  wine  and  liquor 
stores  ;  and  it  told  of  men  sponging  up  liquor  by  sam- 
ples until  it  became  necessary  to  say  that  if  they 
"  sampled  "  they  must  pay  ;  and  then  of  the  self-styled 
wholesale  wine  merchant,  who  was  above  keeping  a 
bar,  finding  that  it  was  profitable  as  well  as  gentle- 
manly to  ask  acquaintances  to  "  sample  "  his  liquors  ; 
and  of  this  sham's  being  kept  up  until  it  became 
necessary  to  hide  the  multitudinous  "  samplers  "  and 
the  multifarious  "  sampling  "  from  the  public  and  the 
police  by  a  screen  or  partition  ;  and,  finally,  of  the 
spread  of  this  "  gentlemanly  "  way  of  keeping  a  tip- 
pling house  ;  so  that  the  very  sight  of  the  word  is 
enough  to  make  one's  gorge  rise.  Very  worthy  and 
well-behaved,  and  even  intelligent,  men  do  keep  bars 
and  taverns  ;  but  if  they  do,  let  them  say  so.  When 
I  see  sample-room  over  a  door,  I  feel  a  respect  for  a 
bar-room,  and  as  if  I  could  take  to  my  heart  a  man 
who  owns  that  he  keeps  a  grog-shop. 

Section.  —  An  unpleasant  Americanism  for  neigh- 
borhood,  vicinity,  quarter,  region  ;   as,  for  instance, 


MISUSED   WORDS  139 

our  section,  tins  section  of  country.  It  is  western,  of 
course,  but  has  crept  eastward  against  the  tide.  It  is 
the  result  of  the  division  of  the  unoccupied  lands  at 
the  West,  for  purposes  of  sale,  into  sections  based 
upon  parallels  of  latitude  and  longitude.  Emigrant 
parties  would  buy  and  settle  upon  a  quarter-section  of 
land  ;  and  they  continued  talking  about  their  section 
even  after  they  had  homes,  and  neighborhoods,  towns, 
villages,  and  counties  —  a  fashion  which,  even  with 
them,  should  have  had  its  day,  and  in  which  they 
should  not  be  imitated. 

Sit  (one  of  the  verbs  a  confusion  in  the  use  of 
parts  of  which  has  previously  been  remarked  upon) 
is  confounded  with  another  word,  set,  as  most  of  my 
readers  well  know.  The  commoner  mistakes  upon 
this  point  I  pass  by ;  but  some  prevail  among  people 
who  fancy  that  they  are  very  exquisite  in  their  speak- 
ing. Most  of  us  have  heard  and  laughed  at  the  story 
of  the  judge  who,  when  counsel  spoke  of  the  setting 
of  the  court,  took  him  up  with,  "  No,  brother,  the 
court  sits  ;  hens  set."  But  I  fear  that  some  of  us 
have  laughed  in  the  wrong  place.  Hens  do  not  set ; 
they  sit,  as  the  court  does,  and  frequently  to  better 
purpose.  No  phrase  is  more  common  than  "  a  setting 
hen,"  and  none  more  incorrect.  A  hen  sits  to  hatch 
her  eggs,  and,  therefore,  is  a  sitting  hen.  Sit  is  an 
active,  but  an  intransitive  verb  —  a  very  intransitive 
verb  —  for  it  means  to  put  one's  self  in  a  position  of 
rest.  Set  is  an  active,  transitive  verb  —  very  active 
and  very  transitive  —  for  it  means  to  cause  another 
person  or  thing  to  sit,  willy-nilly.  A  schoolma'am 
will  illustrate  the  intransitive  verb  by  sitting  down 
quietly,  and  then  the  transitive  by  giving  a  pupil  a 
setting  down  which  is  anything  but  quiet.     This  set* 


140  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

ting  down  is  metaphorical,  and  is  borrowed  from  the 
real,  physical  setting-down  which  children  sometimes 
have,  much  to  their  astonishment.  The  principal 
parts  of  one  of  these  verbs  are  sit,  sat,  sltten  ;  but  of 
the  other,  the  present,  preterite,  and  the  past  partici- 
ple are  in  form  the  same,  set.  Many  persons  forget 
this,  and  use  sat  as  the  preterite  of  set,  thus  :  She  sat 
her  pitcher  down  upon  the  ground.  But  as  we  read 
in  our  translation  of  Matthew's  Gospel  (ch.  xxi.), 
it  was  prophesied  that  Christ  should  come  "  sitting 
upon  an  ass,"  and,  therefore,  his  disciples  took  a  colt 
and  "  they  set  him  thereon."  On  the  other  hand, 
some  persons  use  the  preterite  of  set  for  that  of  sit^ 
e.  g.,  I  went  in  and  set  down  ;  while  others  have  in- 
vented one  labor-saving  monosyllable  for  both  these 
hard-worked  verbs.  For  instance,  "  I  went  to  meet 
him  at  his  office,  sharp  on  time,  and  sot  (sat)  down 
and  waited  for  him,  and  sot,  and  sot,  and  sot ;  and 
when  he  came  in,  he  sot  (set)  me  down  that  his  time 
was  right,  because  he  'd  sot  (set)  his  watch  that  morn- 
ing by  the  City  Hall  clock."  I  have  heard  the  word 
thus  used  by  an  estimable  and  not  unintelligent  mer- 
chant. As  far  as  the  poultry-yard  is  concerned,  the 
hen-wife  sets  the  hen,  but  the  hen  sits.  The  use  of 
the  former  word  for  the  latter  in  this  case  is  so  com- 
mon, and  I  have  heard  it  defended  so  stoutly  by  intel- 
ligent people,  that  I  shall  not  only  refer  to  the  diction- 
aries those  of  my  readers  who  care  to  consult  them,  but 
cite  the  following  examples  in  point :  — 

"As  the  partridge  sitteth  on  eggs  and  hateheth  them  not,"  etc. 
Jeremiah  xvii.  11.     Tr.  1611. 
"  And  birds  sit  brooding  in  the  snow." 

Lovers  Labour  's  Lost,  iv.  3. 
"  Thou  from  the  first 
Wast  present,  and  with  mighty  wings  outspread, 


MISUSED   WORDS  141 

Dove-like  safst  brooding  on  the  vast  abyss, 
And  mad'st  it  pregnant." 

Paradise  Lost,  I.  21. 

When  the  nominative  in  a  sentence  requiring  sit  or 
set  is  the  subject  of  the  action,  the  word  is  set ;  when 
the  nominative  is  not  the  subject,  the  word  is  Siit ;  —  a 
rule  which,  like  most  of  its  kind,  is  superfluous  to  those 
who  can  understand  it,  and  useless  to  those  who  can- 
not. 

Sit  and  set^  unlike  lie  and  lay,  which  have  the  same 
relations  with  each  other  as  the  former  have,  and  are 
subject  to  a  like  confusion,  have  no  tenses  or  partici- 
ples which  are  the  same  in  form. 

There  is  one  peculiarity  in  the  use  of  the  two  for- 
mer which  is  worthy  of  attention.  We  say  that  a 
man  rises  and  sits  ;  but  that  the  sun  rises  and  sets. 
For  this  use  of  set,  which  has  prevailed  since  English 
was  a  language,  and  from  which  it  would  require  an 
unprecedented  boldness  to  deviate,  there  is  no  good 
reason.  It  is  quite  indefensible.  Sets  is  no  part  of 
the  verb  sit ;  and  as  to  setting,  the  sun  sets  nothing. 
For  we  do  not  mean  to  say  that  he  sets  himself  down, 
—  an  expression  which  would  not  at  all  convey  our 
apprehension  of  the  gradual  descent  and  disappear- 
ance of  the  great  light  of  the  world.  If  either  of  these 
words  be  used,  we  should,  according  to  reason  and 
their  meaning,  say  the  sun  sits,  the  sun  is  sitting. 

I  had  supposed  that  this  application  of  the  verb 
Mt  to  the  sinking  of  the  sun  was  inexplicable  as  well 
as  unjustifiable,  when  it  occurred  to  me  that  in  the 
phrase  in  question  set  might  be  a  corruption  of  settle. 
On  looking  into  the  matter,  I  found  reason  for  believ- 
\ng  that  my  conjecture  had  hit  the  mark.  In  tra-> 
eing  this  corruption,  it  should  be  first  observed  that 


142  WORDS  AND   THEIR   USES 

the  Anglo-Saxon  has  both  the  verb  sittan  (sit)  and 
settan  (set).  In  coming  to  us,  these  words  have  not 
changed  their  signification  in  the  least ;  they  have 
only  lost  a  termination.  Indeed,  it  is  only  the  absence 
or  the  presence  of  this  termination  that  makes  thenj 
in  the  one  case  English,  and  in  the  other  Anglo- 
Saxon.  They  have  been  used  straight  on,  with  the 
same  signification,  by  the  same  race  for  at  least  fifteen 
hundred  years.  But  when  that  race  spoke  Anglo- 
Saxon,  they  said,  neither  the  sun  sets  nor  the  sun  sits, 
but  the  sun  settles,  and  sometimes  the  sun  sinks  ;  and 
his  descent  they  called  not  sunset  or  the  sun  setting, 
but  the  sun  settling.  Thus  the  passage  in  Mark's 
Gospel,  i.  32,  which  is  given  thus  in  our  Bible,  "  And 
at  even,  when  the  sun  did  set,  they  brought  him  all 
that  were  diseased,"  etc.,  appears  thus  in  the  Anglo- 
Saxon  version,  "  SoJ)lice  Sa  hit  was  oefen  geworden  6a 
sunne  to  setle  eode."  That  is.  Verily  when  it  was 
evening  made  when  the  sun  to  settle  went.  In  Luke's 
account  of  the  same  matter  our  version  has  "Now 
when  the  sun  was  setting ; "  but  the  Anglo-Saxon 
"  Soplice  Sa  sunne  asaJi "  —  Verily  when  the  sun  sank 
down.  And  the  Maaso-Gothic  version  has ."  MipJ^anei 
pan  sagq  sunno  "  —  when  the  sun  sagged,  or  sank 
down.  In  Genesis  xv.  17,  "  And  it  came  to  pass 
when  the  sun  went  down,"  we  have  again  in  the 
Anglo-Saxon  version  "  ]>a  pa  sunne  eode  to  setle " 
—  when  the  sun  went  to  settle  ;  and  in  Deuteronomy 
xi.  30,  "  by  the  way  where  the  sun  goeth  down,"  is 
in  the  Anglo-Saxon  Bible  "  be  pam  wege  pe  liS  to 
sunnen  setlgange "  —  by  the  way  that  lieth  to  the 
sun  settle-going,  or  settling ;  and  in  Psalms  cxiii.  3, 
"  From  the  rising  of  the  sun  unto  the  going  down  of 
the  same  "  in  Anglo-Saxon  "  From  sunnan  uprine  o3 


MISUSED  WORDS  143 

to  f^etlgange  " —  From  sun's  uprising  even  to  settle- 
going'.  The  word  sell  in  all  these  jiassages  is  not  a 
verb,  but  a  noun ;  and  the  exact  meaning  in  each  case 
is  that  the  sun  was  going  seat-ward  —  toward  his  seat. 
All  the  stronger,  therefore,  is  the  conclusion  that  it  is 
right  to  say  that  the  sun  sits  or  takes  his  seat,  and 
wrong  to  say  that  he  sets :  the  clear  distinction  be- 
tween the  two  Anglo-Saxon  verbs  sittan,  to  sit,  to 
go  down,  and  settan,  to  place  in  a  seat,  to  fix,  being 
remembered. 

This  conclusion  receives  yet  other  support  from  the 
facts  that,  according  to  Herbert  Coleridge's  Glossary, 
swirishig  appears  in  the  English  of  the  thirteenth 
century,  but  sunset  is  not  found,  and  that  in  the  pas- 
sages above  cited,  and  others  in  which  the  same  fact 
is  mentioned,  the  earlier  English  versions  of  the  Bible 
do  not  use  set.  Wycliffe's,  made  about  A.  D.  1385  ; 
Tyndale's,  a.  d.  1536  ;  Coverdale's,  a.  d.  1535,  and 
the  Geneva  version,  a.  d.  1557,  have  either  "  when  the 
sun  went  down,"  or  "  when  the  sun  was  down."  It 
is  not  until  we  I'each  the  Eheims  version,  a.  d.  1582, 
that  we  find  "  in  the  evening,  after  sunset."  But  in 
Thomas  Wilson's  "  Arte  of  Rhethorike,"  A.  d.  1567 
(first  published  in  1553),  I  find  "  All  men  com- 
monly more  rejoice  in  the  sonne  rising  then  thei  do 
in  the  sonne  setting  "  (fol.  35,  6.).  It  would  there- 
fore seem  as  if  the  corruption  of  setle  into  set  had 
been  handed  down  through  common  speech,  and  per- 
haps by  vulgar  writers,  from  the  time  when  our  lan- 
guage passed  from  its  Anglo-Saxon  to  its  so-called 
early  English  period,  but  that  sinisct  was  not  used  by 
scholars  until  the  middle  of  the  sixteenth  century. 

I  offer,  not  dogmatically,  but  yet  with  a  great  de- 
gree of  confidence,  this  explanation  of  our  singular 


144  WORDS  AND   THEIR   USES 

use  o£  the  verb  set  to  express  the  descent  of  the  sun 
to  the  horizon  ;  warning  my  readers  at  the  same  time 
that  the  definitions  of  set  in  dictionaries,  as  meaning 
to  go  down,  to  decline,  to  finish  a  course,  all  rest  upon 
the  presence,  or  rather  the  supposed  presence,  of  this 
word  in  the  old  and  common  phrase  sunset,  which 
is  really  an  abbreviation  of  sun-settling,  the  modern 
form  of  sunnan-setlgang. 

Sociable,  Social.  —  We  are  in  danger  of  losing 
a  fine  and  valuable  distinction  between  these  words. 
This  is  to  be  deplored,  and,  if  possible,  prevented. 
The  desynonymizing  tendency  of  language  enriches 
it  by  producing  words  adapted  to  the  expression  of 
various  delicate  shades  of  meaning.  But  the  promis- 
cuous use  of  two  words  each  of  which  has  a  mean- 
ing peculiar  to  itself,  by  confounding  distinctions  im- 
poverishes language,  and  deprives  it  at  once  of  range 
and  of  power.  The  meaning  of  sociable  is,  fitted  for 
society,  ready  for  companionship,  quick  to  unite  with 
others  —  generally  for  pleasure.  Social  expresses  the 
relations  of  men  in  society,  communities,  or  common- 
wealths. Hence,  social  science.  But  there  is  no  socia- 
ble science,  although  some  French  women  are  said  to 
make  societe  an  art.  A  man  who  is  an  authority  upon 
social  matters  may  be  a  very  unsociable  person.  Those 
who  ai'e  inclined  to  like  that  strange  kind  of  enter- 
tainment called  a  social  surprise,  the  charm  of  which 
is  in  the  going  in  large  bodies  to  a  friend's  house 
unannounced  and  unexpected,  should  at  least  call 
their  performance  a  sociable  surprise  ;  for  it  must  be 
the  crucial  test  of  the  sociability  of  him  to  whom  it 
is  administered.  It  may  possibly  tend  to  a  pleasant 
sociability  among  those  whose  taste  it  suits;  but  its 
social  tendency  is  quite  another  matter. 


MISUSED  WORDS         .  145 

Special  is  a  much  overworked  word,  it  being 
loosely  used  to  mean  great  in  degree,  also  peculiar  in 
kind,  for  the  particular  as  opj^osed  to  the  general,  and 
for  the  specific  as  opposed  to  the  generic.  Sometimes 
it  seems  to  express  a  union  or  resultant  of  all  these 
senses.  This  loose  and  comprehensive  employment 
of  the  word  is  very  old,  at  least  six  hundred  years  ; 
and  yet  it  cannot  but  be  regarded  as  a  reproach  to  the 
language.  But  to  point  out  the  fault  is  easier  than 
to  suggest  a  remedy,  other  than  the  dropping  of  the 
first  and  third  uses,  in  which  it  is  at  least  superfluous. 

Splendid  suffers  from  indiscriminate  use,  as  awful 
does,  but  chiefly  on  the  part  of  those  whom  our  grand- 
fathers were  wont  to  call,  in  collective  compliment, 
the  fair.  A  man  will  call  some  radiant  beauty  a 
splendid  woman ;  but  a  man  of  any  culture  will  rarely 
mar  the  well-deserved  compliment  of  such  an  epithet 
by  applying  it  to  any  inferior  excellence.  But  with 
most  women  nowadays  everything  that  is  satisfactory 
is  splendid.  A  very  charming  one,  to  whose  self  the 
word  might  have  been  well  applied,  regarded  a  friend 
of  mine  with  that  look  of  personal  injury  with  which 
women  meet  minor  disappointments  from  the  stronger 
sex,  because  he  did  not  agree,  avec  effusion^  that  a 
hideous  little  dog  lying  in  her  lap  was  "  perfectly 
splendid  ; "  and  once  a  bright,  intelligent  being  in 
muslin  at  my  side  predicated  perfect  splendor  of  a 
slice  of  roast  beef  which  was  rapidly  disappearing 
before  her,  any  dazzling  qualities  of  which  seemed  to 
me  to  be  due  to  her  own  sharp  appetite.  The  sun  is 
splendid,  a  tiara  of  diamonds  may  be  splendid,  poetry 
may  be  metaphorically  splendid.  But  all  good  poetry 
is  not  sj)lendid  ;  for  instance,  Gray's  "  Elegy."  The 
use  of  splendid  to  express  very  great  excellence  is 
coarse. 


146  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

State  is  much  misused  in  the  sense  of  say.  State, 
from  status,  perfect  participle  of  the  Latin  verb  mean- 
ing to  stand,  means  to  set  forth  the  condition  under 
which  a  person,  or  a  thing,  or  a  cause,  stands.  A  bank- 
rupt is  called  upon  to  state  his  condition,  to  make  a 
statement  of  his  affairs.  But  if  a  man  merely  says  a 
thing,  do  let  us  say  merely  that  he  says  it. 

Storm  is  misused  by  many  people,  who  say  that  it  is 
storming  when  they  mean  merely  that  it  is  raining. 
A  storm  is  a  tumult,  a  commotion  of  the  elements  ; 
but  rain  may  fall  as  gently  as  mercy.  There  are  dry 
storms.  Women  sometimes  storm  in  this  way;  with 
little  effect,  however,  excejjt  upon  very  weak  brethren. 
But  the  gentle  rain  from  a  fair  woman's  eyes,  few 
human  creatures,  not  of  her  own  sex,  can  resist.  A 
dry  storm  not  unfrequently  passes  off  in  rain.  Hence, 
perhaps,  the  confusion  of  the  two  words. 

Tea  is  no  less  or  more  than  tea  ;  and  while  we  call 
strong  broth  beef-tea,  or  a  decoction  of  camomile 
flowers  camomile  tea,  we  cannot  consistently  laugh  at 
Biddy  when  she  asks  whether  we  will  have  tay  tay  or 
coffee  tay. 

Transpire.  —  Of  all  misused  words,  this  verb  is 
probably  the  most  perverted.  It  is  now  very  com- 
monly used  for  the  expression  of  a  mode  of  action 
with  which  it  has  no  relations  whatever.  Words  may 
wander,  by  courses  more  or  less  tortuous,  so  far  from 
their  original  meaning  as  to  make  it  almost  impos- 
sible to  follow  their  traces.  An  instance  of  this,  well 
known  to  students  of  language,  is  the  word  buxom, 
which  is  simply  bow-some  or  bough-some,  i.  e.,  that 
which  readily  bows  or  yields,  like  the  boughs  of  a 
tree.  No  longer  ago  than  when  Milton  wrote,  hovgh- 
some,  which,  as  gh  in  English  began  to  lose  its  guttural 


MISUSED  WORDS  147 

sound,  —  that  of  the  letter  ch  l  in  Greek,  —  came  to  be 
written  huxoni,  meant  simply  yielding,  and  was  of 
general  application. 

"  and,  this  once  known,  shall  soon  return. 
And  bring-  ye  to  the  place  where  thou  and  Death 
Shall  dwell  at  ease,  and  up  and  down  unseen 
Wing  silently  the  buxom  air." 

Paradise  Lost,  II.  840. 

But  aided,  doubtless,  as  Dr.  Johnson  suggests,  by  a 
too  liberal  construction  of  the  bride's  promise  in  the 
old  English  marriage  ceremony,  to  be  "  obedient  and 
buxom  in  bed  and  board,"  it  came  to  be  applied  to 
women  who  were  erroneously  thought  likely  to  be 
thus  yielding ;  and  hence  it  now  means  jilump,  rosy, 
alluring,  and  is  applied  only  to  women  who  combine 
those  qualities  of  figure,  face,  and  expression.  Trans- 
pire,  however,  has  passed  through  no  such  gradual 
modification  of  meaning.  It  has  not  been  modified, 
but  forced.  Its  common  abuse  is  due  solely  to  the 
blunder  of  persons  who  used  it  although  they  were 
ignorant  of  its  meaning,  at  which  they  guessed. 
Transpire  means  to  breathe  through,  and  so  to  pass 
off  insensibly.  The  identical  word  exists  in  French, 
in  which  language  it  is  the  equivalent  of  our  perspire, 
which  also  means  to  breathe  through,  and  so  to  pass 
off  insensibly.  The  Frenchman  says,  J^ai  beaucoup 
transpire  —  I  have  much  perspired.  In  fact,  trans- 
pire  and  perspire  are  etymologically  as  nearly  perfect 
synonyms  as  the  nature  of  language  permits ;  the 
latter,  however,  has,  by  common  consent,  been  set 
apart  in  English  to  express  the  passage  of  a  watery 
secretion  through  the  skin,  while  the  former  is  properly 
used  only  in  a  figurative  sense  to  express  the  passage 
of  knowledge  from  a  limited  circle  to  puldicity.  Here 


148  WORDS  AND   THEIR  USES 

follow  examples  of  the  proper,  and  the  only  proper 
or  tolerable  use  of  this  word.  The  first,  which  is  very- 
characteristic  and  interesting,  is  from  Howell's  Let- 
ters :  — 

"  It  is  a  true  observation  that  among  other  effects  of  affliction 
one  is  to  try  a  friend  ;  for  those  proofs  that  were  made  in  the 
shining,  dazzling  sunshine  are  not  so  clear  as  those  which  break 
out  and  transpire  through  the  dark  clouds  of  adversity."  —  I.  6, 
65. 

The  next  three,  because  I  have  had  such  frequent 
occasion  to  censure  severely  the  general  use  of  words 
in  newspapers,  I  have  pleasure  in  saying,  are  from 
the  columns  of  New  York  journals :  — 

"  Who  the  writer  of  this  pamphlet  was,  who,  four  years  before 
the  great  uprising  in  1848,  saw  so  clearly,  and  spoke  so  pointedly, 
has,  to  our  knowledge,  never  transpired." 

"After  twelve  o'clock  last  night  it  transpired  that  the  Massa- 
chusetts delegation  had  voted  unanimously  in  caucus  to  present 
the  name  of  General  Butler  for  Vice-President." 

"  It  transpired  Monday  that  the  '  Boston  Daily  Advertiser '  has 
been  recently  sold  to  a  new  company  for  something  less  than  two 
hundred  and  fifty  thousand  dollars." 

The  following  very  marked  and  instructive  example 
of  the  correct  use  of  trmispire  is  —  marvellous  to  relate 
—  from  one  of  the  telegrams  of  the  Associated  Press : 

"  At  a  quarter  past  four  o'clock  Judge  Fisher  received  a  com- 
munication from  the  jury,  and  he  sent  a  written  reply.  The 
subject  of  the  correspondence  has  not  transpired." 

The  next  is  from  the  London  "  Times :  "  — 

"  The  Liberals  of  Nottingham,  England,  have  selected  Lord 
Aniberley  and  Mr.  Handel  Cossham  as  their  candidates.  It  has 
not  yet  transpired  who  the  conservative  candidate  will  be.  The 
election,  the  first  after  the  vote  on  the  Reform  bill,  will  be  of 
great  importance." 


I^IISUSED   WORDS  149 

But  the  same  number  of  the  same  paper  furnishes, 
in  tlie  report  of  a  speech  by  a  member  of  Parliament 
(I  neglected  to  note  by  whom),  the  following-  example 
of  the  misuse  of  the  word  in  the  sense  of  occur,  take 
place.  The  insurrection  in  Jamaica  was  the  subject 
of  discussion. 

"  So  that,  uotwithstanding  that  the  population  of  the  Island 
was  450,000,  it  was  stated  that  only  1500  voted  for  the  members 
of  the  Legislature.  The  whole  thing  had  culminated  in  the  hor- 
rors and  the  atrocities  which  had  lately  transpired  there,  and 
which  he  was  obliged  to  believe  had  thrown  discredit  upon  the 
English  government  and  the  English  character  in  every  other 
country  in  the  world." 

So  I  find  it  said,  in  a  prominent  New  York  news- 
paper, that  "  the  Mexican  war  transpired  in  the  year 
1847."  The  writer  might  as  well  —  and,  considering 
the  latitude  in  which  the  battles  were  fought,  might 
better  —  have  said  that  the  Mexican  war  perspired  in 
the  year  1847.  The  most  monstrous  perversion  of  the 
word  that  I  have  ever  met  with  —  than  which  it  would 
seem  that  none  could  be  more  monstrous  —  is  in  the 
following  sentences,  the  first  and  second  from  journals 
of  the  highest  position,  the  last  from  a  volume  of  which 
tens  of  thousands  have  been  sold,  and  which  aspires 
to  the  dignity  of  history  :  — 

"  Before  this  can  be  finished,  years  may  transpire  ;  indeed,  it 
may  take  as  long  to  complete  the  West  Bank  Island  Hospital  as 
it  has  taken  to  erect  the  new  Court-house." 

"  The  police  drill  will  transpire  under  shelter  to-day  in  conse- 
quence of  the  moist  atmosphere  prevailing." 

"  More  than  a  century  was  allowed  to  transpire  before  the 
Mississippi  was  revisited  by  civilized  man." 

To  any  person  who  has  in  mind  the  meaning  of  the 
word,  the  idea  of  years  and  centuries  and  police  drills 
transpiring,  is  ridiculous. 


150  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

There  is  a  very  simple  test  of  the  correct  use  of 
transpire.  If  the  phrase  take  place  can  be  substituted 
for  it,  and  the  intended  meaning  of  the  sentence  is 
preserved,  its  use  is  unquestionably  wrong ;  if  the 
other  colloquial  phrase,  leah  out,  can  be  put  in  its 
place,  its  use  is  correct. 

This  is  illustrated  in  the  following  sentence :  — 

"  An  important  cabinet  meeting  was  held  to-day  ;  but  what 
took  place  did  not  transpire."  ^ 

^  The  writer  of  an  article  in  the  Methodist  Quarterly  Review 
thus  boldly  advocates  the  misuse  of  transpire,  and  flouts  those 
who  oppose  it  :  — 

"  We  have  no  one  word  to  express  the  regular  coming  into  exist- 
ence of  an  event.  .  .  .  Now,  there  is  a  word  which  is  fresh  and 
clear,  which  is  not  very  irrevocably  appropriated  to  any  other 
idea,  and  which  by  popular  healthy  instinct  is  aspiring  to  occupy 
the  blank  spot.  The  word  is  transpire.  '  Oh  no,'  exclaim  the 
effeminates,  '  that  word  must  not  designate  the  taking  place  of  an 
event ;  it  signifies  to  become  knotvn.'  It  is  of  no  use  to  tell  these 
imbeciles  that  the  latter  meaning  is  itself  little  known,  little 
used,  and  little  needed,  while  the  want  it  is  called  to  supply  is  a 
startling  defect  in  the  entire  language.  You  may  supply  rea- 
sons, but  you  cannot  supply  brains.  Your  only  method  is  to  use 
the  needed  word  in  the  needing  place,  and  leave  the  shrieking 
pedant  to  his  spasms." 

To  this  the  answer  is,  first,  that  transpire  is  misused  to  express 
not  the  regular  coming  into  existence  of  an  event,  but  the  most 
haphazard  accidents  of  daily  life,  as  any  one  may  see  ;  next, 
the  flat  contradiction  of  the  assertion  that  the  meaning,  to  be- 
come known,  is  little  known,  little  used,  and  little  needed.  Of 
the  contrary,  examples  are  given  above,  taken  from  newspapers 
of  the  day  ;  and  here  follow  others,  recently  taken  from  the 
minor  news  reports  of  two  New  York  journals,  the  Times  and 
the  Tribune,  which,  although  they  may  sometimes  have  been 
written  by  imbeciles,  it  would  seem  are  rarely  or  never  from  the 
pens  of  pedants  :  — 

"  Nothing  new  transpired  concerning  the  steamer  Euterpe  yes- 
terday. Workmen  were  engaged  in  filling  her  with  a  quantity 
of  hay,"  etc. 


MISUSED   WORDS  151 

Those  Sort.  —  Many  persons  who  should,  and 
who,  perhaps,  do,  know  better,  are  in  the  habit  of 
using  this  incongruous  combination,  e.  g.,  those  sort 
of  men,  instead  of  that  sort  of  men.     The  pronoun 

"  It  transpires  that  the  Gould-Fisk  control  of  the  Bank  is  not 
to  be  consummated  until  January,  although  Jay  Gould  is  already 
a  director." 

"  Hannah  Baker,  a  child  nine  years  old,  was  kidnapped  near 
her  home,  in  Park  Avenue,  by  Catherine  Turner,  and  taken  to 
New  York,  where  it  transpired  that  the  child  disowned  the 
woman  as  her  mother,"  etc. 

"  Soon  after  the  funeral,  however,  it  transpired  that  the  sup- 
posed dead  and  buried  woman  was  alive  and  in  good  health,  tlie 
fact  being  made  certain  to  her  daughters  by  her  actual,  living 
presence." 

And  see  the  following  passage  from  the  very  preamble  to  Reso- 
lutions passed  at  a  political  meeting  within  the  erudite  precincts 
of  Tammany  Hall,  on  the  evening  of  March  29,  1870  :  — 

"  Whereas,  A  call  for  a  meeting  of  the  General  Committee, 
to  be  held  in  Tammany  Hall  this  evening,  has  been  issued, 
having  for  its  ostensible  purpose  the  consideration  of  measures 
of  legislation  relating  to  this  city,  but  it  has  transpired  that  this 
movement  has  originated  with  Mr.  John  Morrissey  and  his 
prominent  associates,"  etc.,  etc. 

The  contemporary  London  press  would  also  furnish  number- 
less instances  like  the  following  :  — 

"  A  meeting  of  the  Tory  party  was  called  by  Mr.  Disraeli,  on 
W^ednesday,  at  Lord  Lonsdale's  liouse.  The  meeting  was  fully 
attended,  —  Lord  Stanley,  however,  being  absent,  —  and  no  re- 
port of  its  proceedings  was  allowed  to  transpire."  —  Spectator, 
April  17,  1869. 

A  page  of  such  examples  might  be  taken  even  from  newspa- 
pers published  within  a  week  of  the  publication  of  the  Metho- 
dist Quarterly's  assertion,  quoted  above.  The  truth  is,  that  this 
word  seems  to  be  used  in  its  proper  sense  by  all  who  know  its 
meaning,  in  which  sense  it  is  valuable,  and  occupies  a  place 
which  can  be  filled  by  no  other. 


152  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

(so-called)  belongs  to  so^^t^  and  not  to  men.     It  would 
be  as  proper  to  say,  those  company  of  soldiers. 

Teuism  is  often  used  for  truths  as  if  such  use  were 
more  elegant  and  scholarly ;  whereas  it  is  the  reverse. 
For  instance,  take  the  following  sentence  from  a  lead- 
ing article  in  a  high-class  New  York  newspaper :  — 

"  That  the  rents  charged  for  tenements  on  the  lower  part  of 
this  island  are  higher  than  men  of  moderate  means  can  afford  to 
pay,  is  a  palpable  truism." 

It  is  no  such  thing.  The  writer  meant  to  say  that 
his  proposition  was  plainly  true ;  but  to  say  so  simply 
would  have  been  far  too  simple  a  style  for  him.  He 
must  write  like  a  moralist  or  a  philosopher,  according 
to  his  notion  of  their  writing.  A  truism  is  a  self-evi- 
dent truth ;  a  truth,  not  merely  the  truth  in  the  form 
of  a  true  assertion  of  fact.  Thus  :  The  sun  is  bright, 
is  not  a  truism :  it  is  a  self-evident  fact,  but  not  a  self- 
evident  truth.  But,  All  men  must  die,  Youth  is  weak 
before  temptation,  are  truisms ;  i.  e.,  self-evident,  or 
generally  admitted  truths. 

Ult.,  Inst.,  Peox.  —  These  contractions  of  ultimo, 
instante,  and  proximo  should  be  used  as  little  as  pos- 
sible by  those  who  wish  to  write  simple  English.  It 
is  much  better  to  say  last  month,  this  month,  next 
month.  The  contractions  are  convenient,  however  ; 
and  much  must  be  sacrificed  to  convenience  in  the 
use  of  language.  But  from  the  usage  in  question  a 
confusion  has  arisen,  of  which  I  did  not  know  until  I 
was  requested  to  decide  a  dispute  whether,  in  a  letter 
written,  for  instance,  on  the  15th  of  September,  "  the 
10th  ult."  would  mean  the  last  10th,  i.  e.,  the  10th  of 
September,  or  the  10th  of  the  last  month,  i.  e.,  the 
10th  of  August,  and  "  the  20th  prox."  would  mean 
the  next  20th  or  the  20th  of  the  next  month,  October 


MISUSED  WORDS  153 

Ult.  and  prox.  are  contractions  of  ultimo  and  proxi- 
mo,  which  are  the  ablative  cases  of  ultimus  and  jjroxi- 
mus^  and  mean,  not  the  last  and  the  next,  but  in  the 
last  and  i;i  the  next  —  what  ?  The  last  and  the  next 
month.  Ultimo  and  j)roximo  are  themselves  contrac- 
tions of  ultimo  mense,  in  the  last  month,  and  proximo 
7nense,  in  the  next  month ;  so  that  "  the  10th  ult." 
means  the  10th  day  in  the  last  month,  and  "  the  20th 
prox."  the  20th  day  in  the  next  month.  Instant  is 
instante  mense^  the  mouth  now  standing  before  us. 
We  do  a  thing  instantly,  or  on  the  instant,  when  we 
do  it  at  the  present  moment,  the  moment  standing 
before  us.  But  I  submit  it  to  the  good  sense  of  my 
readers  that  it  is  better  to  write  August  10th  and 
October  20th,  than  to  write  10th  ult.  and  20th  prox., 
and  that  it  is  nearly  as  expeditious  and  convenient. 

Utter.  —  This  word  is  merely  oiiter  in  another 
form.  The  outer,  or  utter,  darkness  of  the  New 
Testament  is  the  darkness  of  a  place  completely  out- 
side of  the  realm  of  light.  To  utter  is  merely  to  put 
out,  to  put  forth,  or  outside  of  the  person  uttering. 
Utter  nonsense  is  that  which  is  entirely  outside  the 
pale  of  reason.  This  outwardness  is  the  essence  of 
the  word  in  all  its  legitimate  uses,  and  in  all  its  modi- 
fications. But  some  people  seem  to  think  that  be- 
cause, for  instance,  utter  darkness  is  perfect  darkness, 
and  utter  nonsense  absolute  nonsense,  therefore  utter 
means  perfect,  absolute,  complete.  Thus,  in  a  criti- 
cism in  a  literary  paper  upon  a  great  picture,  it  is 
said  of  the  color  that  "  the  effect  is  that  of  utter 
harmony ;  "  and  in  one  of  Miss  Edwards's  novels,  she 
says  of  a  girl  and  a  man,  "Nelly's  nature  fitted  into 
his  nature  utterly."  This  is  sheer  nonsense,  unless 
we  agree  to  deprive  utterly  of  its  proper  meaning,  and 


154  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

make  it  do  superfluous  duty  as  a  mere  synonym  of 
complete  and  perfect,  which  woidd  be  by  just  so  much 
to  impoverish  and  confuse  our  language.  The  use  of 
this  word  in  the  sense  of  absolutely  is  not,  however, 
of  recent  or  of  popular  origin.  Witness  the  following 
examples :  — 

"  Full  cunningly  these  lords  two  he  grette, 
And  did  his  message,  asking  him  anon 
If  that  they  were  broken,  or  aught  wo  begon, 
Or  had  need  of  lodesmen  or  vitaile, 
For  socoure  they  shoulde  nothing  feile, 
For  it  was  utterly  the  queenes  will." 

Chauceb,  Legend  of  Good  Women,  I.  1460. 

"  It  is  not  necessary  that  Traditions  and  Ceremonies  be  in  all 
places  utterly  alike." 

Thirty-Nine  Articles  of  the  Church  of  England,  Art.  34. 

Ventilate.  —  Many  persons  object  to  the  use  of 
this  word  in  the  sense  of  to  bring  into  discussion,  on 
the  ground  that  it  is  a  neologism.  This  use,  of  course, 
is  metaphorical ;  and  while  we  may  say  that  a  man 
airs  his  notions  at  a  public  meeting  or  in  a  newspaper, 
I  am  not  prepared  to  defend  the  good  taste  of  saying 
that  he  ventilates  them.  But  this  use  of  ventilate  is 
not  a  neologism,  as  appears  by  this  passage  in  a  state 
paper  of  the  time  of  Henry  the  Eighth,  quoted  by 
Froude :  "  Nor  shall  it  ever  be  seen  that  the  king's 
cause  shall  be  ventilated  or  decided  in  any  place  out 
of  his  own  realm." 

Veracity.  —  It  is  newspaper  English  to  say,  as 
nov/adays  is  often  said,  that  a  man  is  "  a  man  of  truth 
and  veracity."  Veracity  is  merely  an  Anglicized 
Latin  synonym  of  truthfulness.  Truth  and  veracity 
is  a  weak  pleonasm.  But  veracity  is  properly  applied 
to  persons,  truth  to  things.  A  story  is  or  is  not  true ; 
a  man  is  or  is  not  veracious  —  if  truthful  is  too  plain 


MISUSED  WORDS  155 

a  word.  We  may  doubt  the  truth  of  a  story  because 
we  doubt  the  veracity,  or,  better,  the  truthfuhiess,  of 
the  teller. 

Vicinity.  —  This  word  is  subject  to  no  perversion 
of  sense  that  I  have  observed ;  but  it  is  very  often 
incorrectly  and  vulgarly  used  without  the  possessive 
pronoun  necessary  to  define  it  and  cause  it  to  express 
a  thing-  instead  of  a  thought.  Thus  :  New  York  and 
vicinity,  instead  of  New  York  and  its  vicinity.  With 
equal  correctness  and  good  taste  we  might  say,  New 
York  and  neighborhood ;  which  no  one,  I  believe, 
would  think  of  doing.  This  error  has  arisen  from  the 
frequent  occurrence  of  such  phrases  as,  this  city  and 
vicinity,  i.  e.,  this  city  and  this  vicinity,  this  being 
understood.  So  we  may  say,  this  village  and  neigh- 
borhood. When  a  pronoun  is  used  before  a  common 
noun,  as,  this  town,  this  village,  it  need  not  be  repeated 
after  the  conjunction  which  unites  the  noun  to  vicinity. 
But  otherwise  a  pronoun  is  required  before  vicinity^ 
just  as  one  is  before  neighhorhood,  which,  in  most 
cases  in  which  vicinity  is  used,  is  the  better,  as  well 
as  the  shorter,  word. 

Vulgar,  the  primitive  meaning  of  which  is  com- 
mon, and  which,  from  its  frequent  qualification  of  the 
conduct  and  the  speech  of  the  vulgar,  came  in  natural 
course  to  mean  low,  rude,  impolite,  is  often  misused 
in  the  sense  of  immodest.  A  lady  not  without  culture 
said  to  another  of  a  third,  "  She  dresses  very  low  ;  but 
as  she  has  no  figure,  it  does  n't  look  vulgar  ;  "  mean- 
ing, by  the  feminine  malice  of  her  apology,  that  it 
did  not  look  immodest.  The  gown  was  perhaps  low 
enough  (at  the  top)  to  be  vulgar,  if  material  lowness 
were  vulgarity  ;  but  only  that  which  is  metaphorically 
low  is  vulgar. 


156  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

Widow  Woman.  —  Here  is  an  unaccountable  su- 
perfluity of  words ;  for  it  would  seem  that  the  most 
ignorant  of  those  persons  who  use  the  phrase  must 
know  that  a  widow  is  necessarily  a  woman.  It  would 
be  as  well  to  say  a  female  lady,  or  a  she  cow.  The 
error  is  hai'dly  worth  this  notice ;  but  the  antiquity  of 
the  word  widow  in  exactly  the  same  sense  in  which  it 
is  now  used,  the  remoteness  of  its  origin,  and  the  vast 
distance  which  it  has  travelled  through  ages  without 
alteration  of  any  kind,  —  except  as  to  the  pronun- 
ciation of  V  and  w,  which  are  continually  interchang- 
ing, not  only  in  various  languages,  but  in  the  same 
language,  —  make  it  an  unusually  interesting  word. 
How  many  thousand  years  this  name  for  a  bereaved 
woman  has  been  used,  by  what  variety  of  nations,  and 
over  what  extent  of  the  earth's  surface,  it  would  not 
be  easy  to  determine.  Our  Anglo-Saxon  forefathers 
used  it  a  thousand  years  ago  in  England  and  in  North 
Germany ;  they  spelled  it  widuwe  or  wudewe.  The 
Mseso-Goths,  in  the  fourth  century,  for  the  same  thing 
used  the  same  word  —  widowo.  But  nearly  a  thou- 
sand years  before  that  time  it  was  used  by  the  Latin 
people,  who  wrote  it  vidua.  And  yet  again,  a  thou- 
sand years  and  more  backward,  on  the  slopes  of  the 
Himalayas  a  bereaved  wife  was  called  a  widow ;  for 
in  the  Sanscrit  of  the  Rig- Veda  we  find  the  word 
vidhavu.^  Pronounce  the  v  and  w,  and  see  how  sim- 
ply each  stricken  woman  has  taken  this  word  from 
her  stricken  sister  and  passed  it  on  from  lip  to  lip  as 
they  were  bearing  our  fathers  in  the  weary  pilgrimage 
of  war  and  suffering  through  untold  ages  from  what 

^  I  give  this  on  the  authority  of  Max  Miiller.  My  having  in 
Sanscrit,  like  Orlando's  hoard,  is  a  younger  brother's  revenue  — 
what  I  can  glean  from  the  well-worked  fields  of  my  elders  and 
betters. 


MISUSED  WORDS  157 

are  now  the  remotest  bounds  of  civilization.  The 
Sanscrit  vidhuvd  is  merely  the  word  dhavd,  a  man, 
and  vi,  without ;  so  that  the  word  at  its  original  forma- 
tion meant  simply  a  woman  left  without  a  man,  just 
as  it  does  to-day  ;  and  it  has  remained  all  these  ages 
materially  unchanged  both  in  sound  and  meaning. 

Widow  is  one  of  the  very  few  words  of  which  the 
feminine  form  is  the  original ;  for  owing  to  the  traits, 
functions,  and  relations  of  the  sexes,  among  no  j^eople 
would  a  peculiar  name  be  first  given  to  a  man  who 
was  deprived  of  a  woman.  It  would  be  only  after 
the  condition  of  widowhood  had  been  long  recognized, 
and  conventional  usages  had  narrowed  and  straitened 
the  sexual  relations,  that  it  would  enter  the  mind  of  a 
people  to  give  ividow  its  masculine  companion-word. 
It  must  be  admitted  that  in  English  this  has  been 
done  clumsily.  Widower  is  a  poor  word,  which 
should  mean  one  who  widows,  not  who  is  widowed. 
Its  etymology  seems  uncertain ;  for  it  can  hardly  be  a 
modern  form  of  widiiwa,  which  is  given  by  Morris 
(English  Accidence,  p.  82),  but  not  by  Bosworth,  as 
the  masculine  of  widuwe.  But  finely  formed  and 
touching  as  the  original  feminine  word  is,  it  was  inev- 
itable that  the  preposterousness  'of  forming  upon  it 
a  masculine  counterpart  should  produce  monstrosity. 
The  same  difficulty  did  not  occur  in  Latin  ;  for  al- 
though it  would  seem  that  the  word  must  have  come 
into  that  language  in  its  original  feminine  form,  yet,  as 
the  Latin  had  gender,  all  that  was  necessary  was  to 
give  vidua  a  masculine  termination,  and  it  became 
viduus,  or  a  neuter  and  it  became  viduum.  It  was  an 
adjective  in  Latin  as  doubtless  it  was  first  in  Sanscrit, 
and  it  became  a  noun  also,  like  many  adjectives  in 
most  languages.     By  metaphor  it  came  to  mean  d© 


158  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

prived  —  deprived  of  anything.  But  until  recently 
deprived  was  given  in  Latin  lexicons  as  its  primary 
meaning,  and  deprived  of  wife  or  husband  was  given 
as  its  secondary  and  dependent  meaning,  —  preposter- 
ously, as  we  have  seen.  It  must  have  been  applied 
first  to  women,  then  to  men,  and  last  to  things  in  gen- 
eral, which  is  the  natural  manner  of  growth  in  lan- 
guage. Men  do  not  conceive  an  abstract  idea  and 
then  project  their  thoughts  into  infinite  space  in  search 
of  a  name  for  the  new-born  ;  but  having  names  for 
particular  and  concrete  objects,  they  transfer,  modify, 
and  combine  these  names  to  designate  new  things  and 
new  thoughts.^ 

Witness.  —  This  word  is  used  by  many  persons  as 
a  big  synonym  of  see,  with  absurd  effect.  "  I  de- 
clare," an  enthusiastic  son  of  Columbia  says,  as  he 
gazes  upon  New  York  harbor,  "  this  is  the  most  splen- 
did bay  I  ever  witnessed."  In  which  exclamation,  by 
the  bye,  if  the  speaker  has  much  acquaintance  with 
bays,  the  taste  is  worthy  of  the  English.  Witness,  an 
English  or  Anglo-Saxon  word,  is  from  witan,  to  know, 
and  means  testimony  from  personal  knowledge,  and 
so  the  person  who  gives  such  testimony ;  and  hence 
the  verb  witness,  to  be  able  to  give  testimony  from 
personal  knowledge.  A  man  witnesses  a  murder,  an 
assault,  a  theft,  the  execution  of  a  deed,  or  of  the 
sentence  of  a  felon.  He  witnesses  any  act  at  the 
performance  of  which  he  is  present  and  observing. 
*'  Bear  witness,"  say  we,  "  that  I  do  thus."  But  we 
cannot  witness  a  thing  :  no  more  a  bay  or  a  range  of 
mountains  than  a  poodle  dog  or  a  stick  of  candy. 

^  In  two  out  of  seventy  instances  in  the  English  Bible  a  widow 
is  called  a  widow  woman  ;  the  reason  being,  as  I  am  informed 
by  a  friend  who  is,  what  I  am  not,  a  Hebrew  scholar,  that  in 
those  cases  the  original  reads  "  a  woman  is  a  widow." 


MISUSED   WORDS  159 

And  yet,  if  mere  ancient  usage  and  high  authority 
could  justify  any  foi-ni  of  speech,  this  would  not  be 
without  an  approach  to  such  justification,  as  will  be 
seen  by  the  following  sentence  in  Wycliffe's  "  Apo- 
logy for  the  Lollards  :  "  — 

"  Forso}?  it  is  an  horrible  fing  J>at  in  sum  kirkes  is  witnessid 
marchaundis  to  haue  place."  —  p.  50,  Ed.  Camd.  Soc. 

SQUEAMISH  CANT 

Persons  of  delicacy  so  supersensitive  that  they 
shrink  from  plain  words,  and  fear  to  call  things  by 
their  names,  who  think  evil  of  the  mothers  that  bore 
them,  and,  if  men,  of  the  women  who  have  brought 
them  children,  and  who  are  so  prurient  that  they  prick 
up  their  ears  and  blush  at  any  implied  distinction  of 
sex  in  language,  even  in  the  name  of  a  garment,  would 
do  well  to  avoid  the  rest  of  this  chapter,  which  can- 
not but  give  them  offence.  But  that  would  leave  me 
only  the  well-bred  and  modest  among  my  readers  ;  and 
they  are  they  who  least  need  counsel  in  the  use  of  lan- 
guage. 

Chemise.  —  How  and  why  English  women  came  to 
call  their  first  under-garment  a  chemise,  it  is  not  easy 
to  discover.  For  in  the  French  language  the  word 
means  no  more  or  less  than  shirt,  and  its  meaning 
is  not  changed  or  its  sound  improved  by  those  who 
pronounce  it  shimmy.  Of  the  two  names  shirt  and 
sm,ock,  given  at  a  remote  period  to  this  garment,  the 
first  was  common,  like  chemise  in  French,  to  both 
sexes ;  e.  g.,  the  following  passage  from  Gower's  "  Con- 
fessio  Amantis  :  "  — 

"  Jason  his  clothes  on  him  cast, 
And  made  him  redy  right  anon, 
And  she  her  sherte  did  upon 


160  WORDS  AND   THEIR  USES 

And  cast  on  her  a  mantel  close, 
Withoute  more,  and  than  arose." 

By  common  consent  shirt  came  to  be  confined  to 
the  man's  garment,  and  smock  to  the  woman's,  to  ex- 
press which  it  was  generally,  if  not  universally,  used 
until  the  middle  of  the  last  century.  It  is  now  so 
used  by  some  English  women  of  high  rank  and  breed- 
ing, and  unimpeachable  in  propriety  of  conduct,  while 
by  the  large  majority  it  is  now  thought  coarse  — 
why,  is  past  conjecture.  The  place  of  smock  was 
taken  and  held  for  a  time  by  shift  —  a  very  poor 
word  for  the  purpose,  the  name  of  the  act  of  changing 
being  applied  to  the  garment  changed.  As  smock  fol- 
lowed shirty  so  shift  has  followed  sm,ock  ;  and  women 
have  returned  to  shirt  again,  merely  giving  it  its 
French  name.  From  this  it  is  more  than  possible 
that  the  granddaughters  of  those  who  now  use  it  with 
no  more  thought  that  it  is  indelicate  than  stocking^ 
may  shrink  as  they  now  do  from  smock  or  shift,  and 
for  the  same  reason,  or,  rather,  with  the  same  lack  of 
reason.  Indeed,  the  history  of  our  language  gives  us 
reason  to  believe  that  this  will  surely  happen,  unless 
good  sense,  simplicity,  and  real  purity  of  thought 
should  drive  out  the  silly  shame  that  seeks  to  hide  its 
unnatural  face  behind  a  transparent  veil  of  foreign 
making. 

Enceinte.  —  The  use  of  this  French  word  by  Eng- 
lish-speaking folk  to  mean  with  child,  like  that  of 
accouchement  for  delivery,  seems  to  me  gross,  prurient, 
and  foolish.  Can  there  be  a  sweeter,  purer  phrase 
applied  to  a  woman,  one  better  fitted  to  claim  for  her 
tenderness  and  deference  from  every  man,  than  to  say 
of  her  that  she  is  with  child  ?  What  is  gained  by  the 
use  of  the  French  word,  or  of  the  roundabout  phrase 


MISUSED   WORDS  IGl 

"  in  a  delicate  situation  "  ?  Certainly  nothing  is 
gained  in  delicacy  by  implying,  as  these  periphrastic 
euphemisms  do,  that  her  condition  is  indelicate.  Deli- 
cate health  may  be  owing  to  various  causes  —  and 
yet  even  the  phrase  "  in  delicate  health  "  is  used  by 
many  j^ersons  with  exclusive  limitation  to  pregnancy  or 
child-bearing.  There  is  about  this  a  cowardly,  mean- 
minded  shifting  and  shuffling  which  is  very  contempt- 
ible. Can  there  be  in  language  anything  purer  and 
sweeter  than  the  declaration,  "  He  shall  tenderly  lead 
all  those  that  are  with  young,"  or  that,  "  Woe  unto 
them  that  are  with  child,  and  to  them  that  give  suck, 
in  those  days  "  ?  As  bad  as  accouchement  is  con- 
fined, used  in  a  similar  sense  —  worse,  indeed  ;  for 
the  former  does  mean  a  bringing  to  bed.  The  use  of 
this  word  is  carried  by  some  persons  to  that  pitch  of 
idiocy  that,  instead  of  saying  of  a  woman  that  her 
child  was  born  at  such  or  such  an  hour,  —  half-past 
six,  for  instance,  —  they  will  say  that  she  was  confined 
at  half-past  six  ;  the  fact  being  that  she  was  confined, 
and  from  the  same  cause,  just  as  much  a  few  hours 
before,  and  would  be  for  some  days  afterward.  This 
esoteric  use  of  this  word  is  liable  to  ludicrous  and 
unpleasant  consequences  —  like  this.  A  lady  was 
reading  aloud  in  a  circle  of  friends  a  letter  just  re- 
ceived. She  read,  "  We  are  in  great  trouble.  Poor 
Mary  has  been  confined  "  —  and  there  she  stopped  ; 
for  that  was  the  last  word  on  a  sheet,  and  the  next 
sheet  had  dropped  and  fluttered  away,  and  poor  Mary, 
unmarried,  was  left  really  in  a  delicate  situation  until 
the  missing  sheet  was  found,  and  the  reader  continued 
—  "  to  her  room  for  three  days,  with  what,  we  fear,  is 
suppressed  scarlet  fever."  The  disuse  of  the  verb  to 
ihild  has  been  a  real  loss  to  our  language,  with  the 


162  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

genius  of  which  it  was  in  perfect  harmony,  while  it 
expressed  the  fact  intended  to  be  conveyed  with  a 
simplicity  and  delicacy  which  would  seem  unobjec- 
tionable to  every  one,  except  those  who  are  so  super- 
finely  and  superhumanly  shameful  that  they  think  it 
immodest  that  a  woman  should  bear  and  bring  forth 
a  child  at  all.  It  might  comfort  them  in  the  use  of 
this  word  to  remember  that  the  French,  which  they 
regard  as  a  language  so  much  more  refined  than  their 
own,  has  in  constant  use  an  exactly  correspondent 
word,  —  enfanter.  But  that  might  lead  them  to  say 
that  yesterday  Mrs.  Jones  enfanted.^ 

Female.  —  The  use  of  this  word  for  woman  is  one 
of  the  most  unpleasant  and  inexcusable  of  the  common 
perversions  of  language.  It  is  not  a  Briticism,  al- 
though it  is  much  more  in  vogue  among  British  writ- 
ers and  speakers  than  among  our  own.  With  us  lady 
is  the  favorite  euphemism  for  woman.  For  every 
one  of  the  softer  and  more  ambitious  sex  who  is  dis- 
satisfied with  her  social  position,  or  uncertain  of  it, 
seems  to  share  Mrs.  Quickly's  dislike  of  being  called 
a  woman.  There  is  no  lack  of  what  is  called  authori- 
tative usage  during  three  centuries  for  this  misuse  of 
female.  But  this  is  one  of  those  perversions  which  are 
justified  by  no  example,  however  eminent.  A  cow,  or 
a  sow,  or  any  she  brute,  is  a  female,  just  as  a  woman 
is ;  as  a  man  is  no  more  a  male  than  a  buU  is,  or  a 
boar  ;  and  when  a  woman  calls  herself  a  female,  she 
merely  shares  her  sex  with  aU  her  fellow-females 
throughout  the  brute  creation.^ 

1  See  Note  at  the  end  of  this  chapter. 

^  The  following  whimsical  fling  at  this  squeamishness  is  from 
Graham's  Word  Gossip,  which  has  appeared  since  the  publi- 
cation of  these  chapters  in  their  original  form.     Observe  the 


MISUSED   WORDS  163 

Gentleman,  Lady.  —  These  words  have  Leen 
forced  upon  us  until  they  have  begun  to  be  nauseous, 
by  people  who  will  not  do  me  the  honor  of  reading 
this  book  ;  so  that  any  plea  here  for  man  and  woman 
would  be  in  vain  and  out  of  place.  But  I  will  notice 
a  very  common  misuse  of  the  former,  which  prevails  in 
business  correspondence,  in  which  Mr.  A.  is  addressed 
as  Sir,  but  the  firm  of  A.  B.  &  Co.  as  Gentlemen. 
Now,  the  plural  of  Sir  is  Sirs  ;  and  if  gentleman  has 
any  significance  at  all,  it  ought  not  to  be  made  com- 
mon and  unclean  by  being  applied  to  mere  business 
purposes.  As  to  the  ado  that  is  made  about  "  Mr. 
Blank  and  lady,"  it  seems  to  me  quite  superfluous. 
If  it  pleases  any  man  to  announce  on  a  hotel  book 
that  his  wife,  or  any  other  woman  who  is  travelling 
under  his  protection,  is  a  lady,  a  perfect  lady,  let  him 
do  so  in  peace.  This  is  a  matter  of  taste  and  habit. 
The  world  is  wide,  and  the  freedom  of  this  country 
has  not  yet  quite  deprived  us  of  the  right  of  choosing 
our  associates  or  of  forming  our  own  manners. 

Limb.  —  A  squeamishness  which  I  am  really  ashamed 
to  notice  leads  many  persons  to  use  this  word  exclu- 
sively instead  of  leg.  A  limb  is  anything  which  is 
separated  from  another  thing,  and  yet  joined  to  it. 
In  old  English  limbed  was  used  to  mean  joined. 
Thus,  in  the  "  Ancren  Riwle,"  "  Loketh  that  ye  beon 
euer  mid  onnesse  of  herte  ilimed  togeder,"  i.  e., "  Look 

implication    that  a  young  person  must  be  of  the  female  sex. 
This  is  a  Briticism :  — 

"  In  the  many  surgings  of  the  mighty  crowd  I  had  actually 
labored  to  assist  and  protect  two  (I  was  going  to  say  ladies, 
but  ladies  are  grateful  ;  I  can't  say  young  persons,  for  they 
were  n't  young  ;  nor  can  I  say  women,  for  that  is  considered  a 
slight ;  or  females,  for  such  persons  are  no  longer  supposed  to 
exist)  —  well,  two  individuals  of  a  different  sex  from  my  own." 


164  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

that  ye  be  ever  with  oneness  of  heart  joined  together." 
The  branches  of  a  tree  have  a  separate  individual 
character,  and  are  yet  parts  of  the  tree,  and  thus  are 
limbs.  The  fingers  are  properly  limbs  of  the  hand ; 
but  the  word  is  generally  applied  to  the  greater  divi- 
sions, both  of  trees  and  animals.  The  limbs  of  the 
human  body  are  the  arms  and  the  legs  ;  the  latter 
no  more  so  than  the  former.  Yet  some  folk  will  say 
that  by  a  railway  accident  one  woman  had  her  arms 
broken,  and  another  her  limbs  —  meaning  her  legs  ; 
and  some  will  say  that  a  woman  hurt  her  leg  when  her 
thigh  was  injured.  Perhaps  these  persons  think  that  it 
is  indelicate  for  a  woman  to  have  legs,  and  that  there- 
fore they  are  concealed  by  garments,  and  should  be 
ignored  in  speech.  Heaven  help  such  folk  ;  they  are 
far  out  of  my  reach.  I  can  only  say  to  them  that 
there  is  no  immodesty  in  speaking  of  any  part  or  func- 
tion of  the  human  body  when  there  is  necessity  for 
doing  so,  and  that  when  they  are  spoken  of  it  is  im- 
modest not  to  call  them  by  their  proper  names.  The 
notion  that  by  giving  a  bad  thing  a  wrong  or  an  un- 
meaning name,  the  thing,  or  the  mention  of  it,  is  bet- 
tered, is  surely  one  of  the  silliest  that  ever  entered  the 
mind  of  man.  It  is  the  occasion  and  the  purjDose  of 
speech  that  make  it  modest  or  immodest,  not  the  thing 
spoken  of,  or  the  giving  it  its  proper  name. 

Retire.  —  If  you  are  going  to  bed,  say  so,  should 
there  be  occasion.  Don't  talk  about  retiring,  unless 
you  would  seem  like  a  prig  or  a  prurient  prude. 

Rooster.  —  A  rooster  is  any  animal  that  roosts. 
Almost  all  birds  are  roosters,  the  hens,  of  course,  as 
well  as  the  cocks.  What  sense  or  delicacy,  then,  is 
there  in  calling:  the  cock  of  the  domestic  fowl  a  roos- 
ter,  as  many  people  do  ?     The  cock  is   no  more  a 


MISUSED  WORDS  165 

rooster  than  the  hen  ;  and  domestic  fowls  are  no  more 
roosters  than  canary  birds  or  peacocks.  Out  of  this 
nonsense,  however,  people  must  be  laughed  rather  than 
reasoned. 

Note  (p.  162).  —  Southey  uses  the  verb  to  child  in  *'  The  Bat- 
tle of  Blenheim,"  one  of  the  simplest  and  most  popular  of  his 
poems. 

"  And  many  a  childing  mother  died." 

How  much  more  truly  decent  and  delicate  this  is  than  the  follow- 
ing i)assage  from,  I  am  sorry  to  say,  the  London  "  Medical 
Press: "  — 

"  For  what  female  about  legitimately  to  become  a  mother 
would  desire  to  be  among  strangers  at  such  a  time  ! " 

That  a  physician,  of  all  men,  should  call  a  wife  near  her  deliv- 
ery, or  a  married  woman  near  childbirth,  by  such  a  sickening 
roundabout  phrase  as  "  a  female  about  legitimately  to  become  a 
mother  !  "  But  the  extremity  of  this  nauseating  nonsense  was 
reached  in  a  woman's  letter  which  was  produced  in  a  divorce 
case  in  some  Western  State.  The  wife,  who  was  herself  with 
child  when  she  was  married,  discovered,  about  six  months  after- 
wards, a  letter  addressed  to  her  husband  in  a  feminine  hand, 
which  she  was  dishonorable  enough  to  open  and  read.  In  it  she 
found,  as  she  deserved  to  find,  this  question:  —  "  Did  you  marry 
that  child  because  she  too  was  en  famille  ?  "  As  a  combination 
of  ignorant  pretension  and  prurient  prudery,  this  is  unsurpassa- 
ble. En  famille  means  at  home,  without  ceremony,  in  the  family 
circle,  domestic.  This  poor  creature  thought  she  was  elegantly 
using  the  French  for  that  hideous  English  phrase,  "  In  the  fam« 
ily  way." 


CHAPTER  VI 

SOME   BRITICISMS 

I  HAVE  heretofore  designated  the  misuse  of  certain 
words  as  Briticisms.  There  is  a  British  affectation  in 
the  use  of  a  few  other  words  which  is  worthy  of  some 
attention.  And  in  saying  that  a  form  of  English 
speech  is  of  British  origin,  or  is  a  Briticism,  I  mean 
that  it  has  arisen  or  come  into  vogue  in  Great  Britain 
since  the  beginning  of  the  eighteenth  century,  when, 
by  the  union  of  England  and  Scotland  (a.  d.  1706— 
7),  the  King  of  England  and  of  Scotland  became 
King  of  the  United  Kingdom  of  Great  Britain  and 
Ireland,  a  British  took  the  place  of  an  English  Par- 
liament, and  Englishmen  became  politically  Britons. 
This  period  is  one  of  mark  in  social  and  literary,  as 
well  as  in  political  history.  To  us  it  is  one  of  inter- 
est, because,  about  that  time,  although  our  political 
bonds  were  not  severed  until  three  quarters  of  a  cen- 
tury later,  our  absolute  identity  with  the  English  of 
the  mother  country  may  be  regarded  as  having  ceased. 
For,  after  a  moderate  Jacobite  exodus  at  the  end  of 
the  seventeenth  century,  there  was  comparatively  little 
emigration  from  the  old  England  to  the  new.  They 
change  their  skies,  but  not  their  souls,  who  cross  the 
sea  ;  and  whatever  the  population  of  this  country  may 
become  hereafter,  it  had  remained,  till  within  twenty- 
five  years,  as  to  race  an  English  people,  just  as  abso- 


SOME  BRITICISMS  167 

lutely  as  if  our  fathers  had  not  left  the  Old  Home, 
The  history  of  England,  of  the  old  England,  pure 
and  simple,  is  onr  history.  In  British  history  we 
have  only  the  interest  of  kinsmen  ;  but  the  English 
language  and  English  literature  before  the  modern 
British  period  belong  to  both  of  us,  in  the  same  com- 
pleteness and  by  the  same  title  —  inheritance  from 
our  common  fathers,  who  spoke  it  and  wrote  it,  quick- 
ened by  the  same  blood,  on  the  same  soil.  And,  in 
fact,  the  English  of  the  period  when  Shakespeare 
wrote  and  the  Bible  was  translated  has  been  kept  in 
use  among  people  of  education  somewhat  more  in  the 
new  England  than  in  the  ohl.  All  over  the  country 
there  are  some  words  and  phrases  in  common  use,  and 
in  certain  parts  of  New  England  and  Virginia  there 
are  many,  which  have  been  dropped  in  British  Eng- 
land, or  are  to  be  found  only  among  the  squires  and 
farmers  in  the  recesses  of  the  rural  counties.  The 
forms  of  speech  which  may  be  conveniently  called 
Briticisms  are,  however,  generally  of  later  origin  than 
the  beginning  of  the  British  empire.  They  have  al- 
most all  of  them  sprung  up  since  about  A.  D.  1775. 

As  WELL.  —  This  phrase  is  improperly  used  by 
some  British  writers  in  the  sense  of  all  the  same. 
For  instance,  "  Her  aged  lover  made  her  presents,  but 
just  as  well  she  hated  the  sight  of  him  and  the  sound 
of  his  voice  ; "  i.  e.,  she  hated  him  all  the  same.  This 
misusage  has  yet  no  foothold  here,  although,  owing  to 
the  influence  of  second-i-ate  British  novels,  it  begins 
to  be  heard. 

Awful.  —  It  would  seem  superfluous  to  say  that 
awful  is  not  a  synonym  of  very,  were  it  not  that  the 
word  is  thus  used  by  many  people  who  should  know 


168  WORDS  AND   THEIR  USES 

better  than  to  do  so.  The  misuse  is  a  Briticism ;  but 
it  has  been  spreading  here  within  the  last  few  years. 
I  have  heard  several  educated  English  gentlemen 
speak  in  sober,  unconscious  good  faith  of  "  awfully 
nice  girls,"  "awfully  pretty  women,"  and  "awfully 
jolly  people."  That  is  awful  which  inspires  or  is 
inspired  by  awe ;  and  in  the  line  in  the  old  metrical 
version  of  the  Hundredth  Psalm,  — 

"  Glad  homage  pay  with  awful  mirth,"  — 

Tate  and  Brady  did  not  mean  that  we  were  to  be 
awfully  jolly,  or  very  mirthful  or  gay,  in  our  worship. 
Observe  here,  again,  how  misuse  debases  a  good  and 
much-needed  word,  and  voids  it  of  its  meaning,  by 
just  so  much  impoverishing  the  language. 

Commence.  —  There  is  a  British  misuse  of  this 
word  which  is  remarkably  coarse  and  careless.  British 
writers  of  all  grades  but  the  very  highest  will  say,  for 
instance,  that  a  man  went  to  London  and  commenced 
poet,  or  commenced  politician.  Mr.  Swinburne  says 
that  "  Blake  commenced  pupil ;  "  and  Pope,  quoted  by 
Johnson,  — 

"  If  wit  so  much  from  ignorance  undergo, 
Ah,  let  not  learning  too  commence  its  foe." 

A  man  may  commence  life  as  an  author,  or  a  poli- 
tician, or  he  may  commence  a  book,  or  any  other  task, 
although  it  is  better  to  say  he  begins  either.  But 
it  is  either  a  state  or  an  action  that  he  commences. 
Commencement  cannot  be  properly  predicated  of  a 
noun  which  does  not  express  the  idea  of  continuance. 
It  may  be  said  that  a  woman  commences  married  life, 
or  that  she  commences  jilting,  but  not  that  she  com- 
mences wife,  or  commences  jilt,  any  more  than  that 
she  ends  hussy. 


SOME  BRITICISMS  1C9 

Directly.  —  The  radical  meaning  of  this  word  is, 
in  a  right  line ;  and  hence,  as  a  right  line  is  the  short- 
est distance  between  two  points,  it  means  at  once,  im- 
mediately. Its  synonym  in  both  senses  is  a  good 
English  word,  now,  unhappily,  somewhat  obsolete  — 
straightway.  But  John  Bull  uses  directly  in  a  way 
that  is  quite  indefensible  —  to  wit,  in  the  sense  of 
when,  as  soon  as.  This  use  of  the  word  is  a  wide- 
spread Briticism,  and  prevails  even  among  the  most 
cultivated  writers.  For  instance,  in  the  London 
"  Spectator  "  of  May  2, 1867,  it  is  said  that  "  Directly 
Mr.  Disraeli  finished  speaking,  Mr.  Lowe  rose  to  op- 
pose," etc.  Anglice,  As  soon  as  Mr.  Disraeli  finished 
speaking,  etc.  It  is  difficult  to  trace  by  continuous 
steps  the  course  of  this  strange  perversion,  for  which 
there  is  neither  justification  nor  palliation.  A  fort- 
night ago  I  should  have  said  that  it  was  unknown 
among  speakers  and  writers  of  American  birth ;  but 
since  then  I  have  read  Mr.  Howells's  charming  book, 
"  Italian  Journeys,"  than  which  I  know  no  book  of 
travel  more  richly  fraught  with  pleasure  to  a  gentle 
reader.  And  by  a  gentle  reader  I  mean  one  who,  like 
its  author,  can  look  not  only  with  delight  vipon  all 
that  is  beautiful  and  lovable,  but  with  sympathy  upon 
that  which  is  neither  beautiful  nor  lovable  in  the  cus- 
toms and  characters  of  those  who  are  strangers  to  him, 
whose  ways  of  wickedness  are  not  his  ways,  and  whose 
follies  are  foreign  to  him,  —  one  who  can  admire  the 
boldness  of  an  impostor,  and  see  the  humorous  side  of 
rascality.  When  a  traveller  sees  with  Mr.  Howells's 
very  human  eyes,  and  writes  with  his  graphic  and 
humorous  pen,  —  a  pen  that  caricatures  with  a  keen- 
ness to  which  malice  gives  no  edge,  —  travelling  with 
him  on  paper,  which  is  generally  either  the  dullest  or 


170  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

the  most  frivolous  of  employments,  is  one  of  the  most 
inspiriting,  and  not  the  least  instructive.  Mr.  How- 
ells's  style,  too,  is  so  good,  it  shows  such  unobtrusive 
and  seemingly  unconscious  mastery  of  idiomatic  Eng- 
lish, that  I  notice  with  the  more  freedom  two  or  three 
lapses,  one  of  which,  at  least,  I  attribute  to  the  dele- 
terious influences  of  foreign  travel.  I  am  sure  that  it 
was  not  in  New  England,  and  not  until  after  he  had 
been  subjected  to  daily  intercourse  with  British  speak- 
ers and  to  the  influence  of  British  journals,  that  he 
learned  to  write  such  sentences  as  these :  "  Directly  I 
found  the  house  inhabited  by  living  people,  I  began 
to  be  sorry  that  it  was  not  as  empty  as  the  library 
and  the  street,"  p.  30.  "  I  was  more  interested  in  the 
disreputable  person  who  mounted  the  box  beside  our 
driver  directly  we  got  out  of  our  city  gate,"  p.  218. 
Mr.  Howells  meant  that  when  he  found  the  house  in- 
habited he  began  to  be  sorry,  and  that  the  interesting 
and  disreputable  person  mounted  his  coach-box  as 
soon  as  they  got  out  of  the  gate.  Mr.  Howells  is  the 
first  born  and  bred  Yankee  that  I  have  known  to  be 
guilty  of  this  British  offence  against  the  English  lan- 
guage ;  and  his  example  is  likely  to  exert  so  much 
more  influence  than  my  precept,  that,  unless  he  re- 
pents, I  am  likely  to  be  pilloried  as  his  persecutor  by 
the  multitude  of  his  followers.  But  I  am  sure  that 
he  will  repent,  and  that,  with  the  amiable  leaning 
toward  iniquity  which  enables  him  to  throw  so  fresh 
a  charm  over  the  well-trodden  ways  of  Italy,  he  will 
even  think  kindly  of  the  critic  who  has  put  him  upon 
the  barb  as  if  he  loved  him. 

So  sure  am  I  of  this,  that,  wishing  to  use  him  again 
as  an  eminent  example  of  error,  I  shall  bring  forward 
two  other  faults  which  I  have  noticed  in  his  book,  and 


SOME  BRITICISMS  171 

in  which  he  is  not  singular  among  Yankees.  There 
is  among  some  people  a  propensity,  which  is  of  late 
growth,  and  is  the  fruit  of  presuming  half-knowledge, 
to  give  to  adjectives  formed  participially  from  nouns, 
and  to  nouns  used  as  adjectives,  a  plural  form,  the 
effect  of  which  is  laughably  pedantic,  as  all  efforts 
to  struggle  away  from  simple  idiom  to  superfine  cor- 
rectness are  apt  to  be.  For  instance,  the  delicious 
confection,  calf's-foot  jelly,  is  advertised  in  many 
confectionary  windows  as  calvies' -feet  jelly  —  the  con- 
fectioners having  been  troubled  in  their  minds  by  the 
reflection  that  there  went  more  than  one  calf's  foot  to 
the  making  of  their  jelly.  So  I  once  heard  a  richly 
robed  dame,  whose  daughter,  named  after  the  goddess 
of  wisdom,  was  suffering  pangs  that  only  steel  forceps 
could  allay,  say,  with  a  little  flourish  of  elegance,  that 
"M'nervy  was  a  martyr  to  the  teethache."  And 
could  this  gorgeous  goddess-bearer  doubt  that  she  was 
right,  when  she  found  Mr.  Howells  saying  that  the 
peasants  in  Bassano  return  from  their  labor  "  led  in 
troops  of  eight  or  ten  by  stalwart,  white-^ee^Aec?,  bare- 
legged maids !  "  She  would  probably  be  shocked  by 
the,  bareness  of  the  maidens'  legs,  but  she  would  glory 
in  the  multitudinous  dental  epithet  which  Mr.  Howells 
applies  to  them.  But  because  the  most  beautiful  of 
the  Nereides  trips  through  our  memories  as  silver-footed 
Thetis,  do  we,  therefore,  think  of  her  as  a  unijDcde,  a 
one-legged  goddess  ?  How  would  it  do  for  the  Cam- 
bridge lads  to  translate  &\\ver-feeted  Thetis  ?  And  if 
we  have  calves^-feet  jelly,  why  must  not  we,  a  fortiori^ 
have  oy&ters-^vs:  and  jo^wwis-pudding  ?  and  if  white- 
teethed  maids,  why  not  ^ee^A-brushes?  and,  above  all, 
why  do  we  commit  the  monstrous  absurdity  of  speak- 
ing of  the  numberless  human  race  as  mankind  instead 


172  WORDS  AND   THEIR   USES 

of  7?^en-kind?  A  noun  used  as  an  adjective  expresses 
an  abstract  idea  ;  and  when  by  the  introduction  of  the 
plural  form  this  idea  is  broken  up  into  a  collective 
multitude  of  individuals,  it  falls  ludicrously  into  con- 
crete ruin. 

A  like  endeavor  toward  precision  has  led  some  folk 
to  say,  for  instance,  that  a  man  was  on  Broadway,  or 
that  such  and  such  an  event  took  place  on  Tremont 
Street ;  and  Mr.  Howells  countenances  this  folly  by 
writing,  "  There  were  a  few  people  to  be  seen  on  the 
street."  Let  him,  and  aU  others  who  would  not  be 
at  once  childish  and  pedantic,  say  in  the  street,  in 
Broadway,  and  not  be  led  into  the  folly  of  endeavor- 
ing to  convey  the  notion  that  a  man  was  resting  upon 
or  moving  over  an  extended  surface  between  two  lines 
of  houses.  A  house  itself  is  in  Broadway,  not  on 
it ;  but  it  may  stand  on  the  line  of  the  street ;  and 
an  event  takes  place  in  a  certain  street,  whether  the 
actors  are  on  the  pavement  or  on  the  steps,  or  in  the 
balcony  of  a  house  in  that  street,  or  in  the  house 
itself.  We  are  in  or  within  a  limited  siu"face,  but  on 
or  upon  one  that  is  without  visible  boundaries.  Thus, 
a  man  is  in  a  field,  but  on  a  plain.  Some  generations, 
at  least,  will  pass  away  before  a  man  shall  appear 
who  will  write  plainer,  simpler,  or  better  English 
than  John  Bunyan  wrote  ;  and  he  makes  Christian 
say,  "  Apollyon,  beware  what  you  do,  for  I  am  in  the 
king's  highway." 

There  is  no  telling  into  what  absurdity  these  blind 
gropers  after  precision  will  stumble  when  we  find 
them  deep  in  such  a  slough  as  written  over  the  sig- 
nature^ fancying  the  while  that  they  stand  on  solid 
ground.  A  man's  signature,  we  are  told,  is  at  the 
bottom  of  his  letter,  and  therefore  he  writes  over  the 


SOME  BRITICISMS  173 

signature !  But  —  answering  a  precisian  according  to 
his  preciseness — the  signature  was  not  there  while 
the  man  wrote  the  letter  ;  it  was  added  afterward. 
IIow,  then,  was  the  letter  written  over  the  signature  ? 
This  is  the  very  lunacy  of  literalism.  A  man  writes 
under  a  signature  whether  the  signature  is  at  the  top, 
or  the  bottom,  or  in  the  middle  of  his  letter.  For 
instance,  an  old  correspondent  of  the  New  York 
*'  Times  "  writes  under  the  signature  of  "  A  Veteran 
Observer,"  and  his  letters,  written  sub  tegmine  fagii 
are  under  the  date  of  "  The  Beeches."  And  as  they 
would  be  under  that  date  whether  it  were  written  at 
the  top,  or,  as  dates  often  are,  at  the  bottom  of  the  let- 
ter, so  they  are  under  that  signature,  wherever  on  the 
sheet  it  may  be  signed.  A  soldier  or  a  sailor  fights 
under  a  flag,  not,  as  Mr.  Precisian  would  have  it, 
because  the  flag  is  flying  over  his  head,  but  because 
he  is  under  the  authority  which  that  flag  represents. 
Sometimes  he  does  his  fighting  above  the  flag,  as 
is  often  the  case  with  sharpshooters  in  both  army 
and  navy  ;  and  Farragut,  in  the  futtock  shrouds  of 
the  Hartford,  fought  the  battle  of  Mobile  Bay  as 
much  under  the  United  States  flag  that  floated  ten  or 
fifteen  feet  below  him,  as  if  he  had  issued  his  orders 
from  the  bottom  of  the  hold.  So  writs  are  issued 
under  the  authority  of  a  court,  although  the  seal  and 
the  signature  which  represent  that  authority  are  at 
the  bottom  of  the  writ ;  and  a  man  issues  a  letter 
under  his  signature,  i.  e.,  with  the  authority  or  attes- 
tation given  by  his  signature,  whether  the  signature  is 
at  top  or  bottom.  The  use  of  such  a  phrase  as  over 
the  signature  is  the  sign  of  a  tendency  which,  if  un- 
checked, will  place  our  language  under  the  formative 
influence,  not  of   those  who   act   instinctively  under 


174  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

guidance  of  what  we  call  its  genius,  or  of  scholars  and 
men  of  general  culture,  but  of  those  who  have  least 
ability  to  fashion  it  to  honor  —  the  literate  folk  who 
know  too  much  to  submit  to  usage  or  authority,  and 
too  little  rightfully  to  frame  usage  or  to  have  au- 
thority themselves. 

I  shall  notice  only  one  other  bad  example  set  by 
Mr.  Howells,  that  in  the  phrase  "  when  we  came  to 
settle  for  the  wine."  He  meant,  to  pay  for  the  wine, 
that  and  nothing  more.  To  settle  is  to  fix  firmly,  and 
so,  to  adjust ;  and  therefore  the  adjusting  of  accounts 
is  well  called,  by  figure,  their  settlement.  But  the 
phrase  to  settle,  meaning  to  pay,  had  better  be  left  en- 
tirely to  the  use  of  those  sable  messengers,  rapidly 
passing  away,  who  summon  j^assengers  on  steamboats 
to  "  step  up  to  the  cap'n's  office  and  settle."  For 
accounts  may  be  settled,  that  is,  they  may  be  made 
clear  and  satisfactory,  —  as  the  passenger  wished  his 
cup  of  coffee  to  be  made  when  he  called  upon  the 
negro  to  take  it  to  the  captain's  office  and  have  it 
settled,  —  and  yet  they  may  not  be  paid.  To  settle 
your  passage  means,  if  it  means  anything,  nothing 
more  or  less  than  to  pay  your  fare ;  and  there  is 
no  reason  whatever  for  the  use  of  the  former  phrase 
instead  of  the  latter.  It  displaces  one  good  word, 
and  perverts  another  ;  while  the  use  of  settle  without 
any  object,  which  is  sometimes  heard,  as.  Hadn't 
you  better  settle  with  me  ?  is  hideous. 

These  four  slips  are  notable  as  being  all  that  I  re- 
marked in  reading  "  Italian  Journeys  "  thoroughly 
and  carefully.  There  have  been  very  few  books,  if 
any,  published  on  either  side  of  the  water,  that  would 
not  furnish  more  as  well  as  greater  opportunities  to  a 
carping  critic. 


SOME  BRITICISMS  175 

Drive  and  Ride  are  among  the  words  as  to  which 
there  is  a  notable  British  affectation.  According  to 
the  present  usage  of  cultivated  society  in  England, 
ride  means  only  to  go  on  horsehack,  or  on  the  back 
of  some  beast  less  dignified  and  comfortable,  and 
drive,  only  to  go  in  a  vehicle  which  is  drawn  by  any 
creature  that  is  driven.  This  distinction,  the  non- 
recognition  of  which  is  marked  by  cousin  Bull  as 
an  Americanism,  is  quite  inconsistent  with  common 
sense  and  good  English,  and  it  involves  absurd  con- 
tradictions. Di^ve  comes  to  us  straight  from  the 
Anglo-Saxon  :  it  means  to  urge  forward,  to  expel,  to 
eject,  and  di^ift  is  simply  that  which  is  driven. 
There  is  no  example  of  any  authority  earlier  than 
this  century  known  to  me,  or  quoted  by  any  lexico- 
grapher, of  the  use  of  drive  with  the  meaning,  to  pass 
in  a  carriage.  Dr.  Johnson  gives  that  definition  of 
the  word,  but  he  is  able  to  support  it  only  by  the 
following  passages  from  Shakespeare  and  Milton, 
which  are  quite  from  the  purpose  :  — 

"  There  is  a  litter  ready :  lay  him  out, 
And  drive  toward  Dover." 

King  Lear. 

"  Thy  foaming  chariot  wheels,  that  shook 
Heaven's  everlasting  frame,  while  o'er  the  neck 
Thou  drov^st  of  warring  angels  disarrayed." 

Paradise  Lost. 

In  the  first  of  these  the  person  addressed  is  merely 
ordered  to  drive  or  urge  forward  his  carriage  to 
Dover ;  in  the  second,  Jehovah  is  represented  as 
urging  the  wheels  of  his  war  chariot  over  his  fallen 
enemies.  There  is  not  a  suggestion  or  implication  of 
the  thought  that  drive  in  either  case  means  to  pass  in 
any  way,  or  means  anything  else  than  to  urge  onward. 


176  WORDS   AND  THEIR  USES 

Dr.  Johnson  might  as  well  have  quoted  from  the  ac- 
count in  Exodus  of  the  passage  of  the  Red  Sea,  that 
the  Lord  took  off  the  chariot  wheels  of  the  Egyptians, 
that  "  they  drave  them  heavily."  Drive  means  only 
to  force  on ;  but  ride  means,  and  always  has  meant, 
to  be  borne  up  and  along,  as  on  a  beast,  a  bird,  a 
chariot,  a  wagon,  or  a  rail.  We  have  seen  that 
Shakespeare,  and  Milton,  and  the  translators  of  the 
Bible  use  drive  in  connection  with  chariot  when  they 
wish  to  express  the  urging  it  along ;  but  when  they 
wish  to  say  that  a  man  is  borne  up  and  onward  in  a 
chariot,  they  use  ride. 

"  And  Pharaoh  made  him  [Joseph]  to  ride  in  the  second  chaiv 
iot  which  he  had."  —  Genesis  xli.  43. 

"And  I  will  overthrow  the  chariots  and  those  that  ride  in 
tliem  ;  and  the  horses  and  their  riders  shall  come  down,  every 
one  by  the  sword  of  his  brother."  —  Haggai  ii.  22. 

•'  So  Jehu  rode  in  a  chariot,  and  went  to  Jezreel.  .  .  .  And 
the  watchman  told,  saying,  He  came  even  unto  them,  and  cometh 
not  again;  and  the  driving  is  like  the  driving  of  Jehu  the  son  of 
Nimshi ;  for  he  driveth  furiously."  —  2  Kings  ix.  16,  20. 

In  these  passages  d^'ive  and  ride  are  used  in  what 
is  their  proper  sense,  and  has  been  since  long  before 
the  days  of  the  Heptarchy,  and  as  they  are  used  now 
in  New  England.  And  yet  only  a  few  days  since,  as 
I  spoke  of  riding  to  a  British  friend,  he  said  to  me, 
pleasantly,  but  with  the  air  of  a  polite  teacher,  "  You 
use  that  word  differently  to  what  we  do.  We  ride  on 
horseback,  but  we  drive  in  a  carriage ;  now,  I  have 
noticed  that  you  ride  in  a  cari-iage."  "  The  distinc- 
tion seems  to  be,  then,"  I  replied,  "  that  when  you  are 
on  an  animal,  you  ride,  and  when  you  are  in  a  vehicle, 
you  drive."  "  Exactly  ;  don't  you  see  ?  quite  so." 
"  Well,  then  "  (we  were  in  Broadway),  "  if  you  had 


SOME  BRITICISMS  177 

corae  down  from  the  Clarendon  in  that  omnibus,  you 
would  say  that  you  drove  down,  or,  if  you  went  from 
one  place  to  another  in  a  stage-coach,  that  you  drove 
there."  "  'M  !  ah  !  no,  not  exactly.  You  know  one 
rides  in  a  'bus  or  a  stage-coach,  but  one  drives  in 
one's  own  carriage  or  in  a  private  vehicle."  I  did  not 
answer  him.  Our  British  cousins  will  ere  long  see 
the  incorrectness  of  this  usage-and  its  absurd  incon- 
gruity, and  will  be  able  to  say,  for  instance,  —  for 
are  they  not  of  English  blood  and  speech  as  well  as 
we?  —  We  all  rode  down  from  home  in  the  old  carry- 
all to  meet  you,  and  John  drove.  But  if  they  insist, 
in  such  a  case,  upon  saying  that  they  all  drove^  we 
shall  have  reason  to  suspect  that  there  is  at  least  the 
beginning  of  a  new  language,  —  the  British,  —  and 
that  the  English  tongue  and  English  sense  has  fled  to 
the  Yankees  across  the  sea. 

KiGHT.  —  A  Briticism  in  the  use  of  this  word  is 
creeping  in  among  us.  It  is  used  to  mean  obligation, 
duty.  On  one  of  those  celebrations  of  St.  Patrick's 
day  in  the  city  of  New  York,  when,  in  token  of  the 
double  nationality  of  its  governing  classes,  the  City 
Hall  is  decorated  with  the  Irish  and  the  United  States 
flag,  and  miles  of  men,  each  one  like  the  other,  and 
all  wearing  stove-pipe  hats  and  green  scarfs,  are  al- 
lowed to  take  possession  of  its  great  thoroughfares,  in 
acknowledgment  of  the  large  share  which  their  fore- 
fathers took  for  two  hundred  and  fifty  years  in  fram- 
ing our  government  and  establishing  our  society  upon 
those  truly  Irish  principles  of  constitutional  liberty 
and  law  which  are  the  glory  and  the  safeguard  of  our 
country,  and  in  acknowledgment,  also,  of  that  devo- 
tion to  the  great  cause  of  religious  freedom  which 
brought  those  Celtic  pilgrims  to  our  shores  —  on  one 


178  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

of  those  occasions  I  heard  an  alien  creature,  a  Yankee, 
who  had  presumed  to  drive  out  jauntily  in  a  wagon 
on  that  sacred  and  solemn  day,  and  who  ventured  to 
be  somewhat  displeased  because  he  had  been  detained 
three  quarters  of  an  hour  lest  he  should  break  the 
irregularity  of  that  line,  and  interrupt  his  masters' 
pleasure  —  I  heard  this  Yankee  say  to  the  policemen, 
as  he  saw  the  Fourth  Avenue  cars  allowed  to  pursue 
their  course  (probably  because  it  was  thought  they 
might  contain  some  of  the  females  of  the  dominant 
race),  "  What  do  you  stop  me  for  ?  The  cars  have  as 
good  a  right  to  be  stopped  as  the  carriages."  This 
was  unpleasant.  That  he  should  have  stood  humbly 
before  his  masters,  having  put  a  ballot  into  their 
hands  with  which  to  break  his  back,  was  a  small  mat- 
ter ;  but  of  his  language  he  should  have  been  ashamed. 
He  could  not  have  spoken  worse  English  if  he  were 
Cockney ;  and  from  some  Cockney  he  must  have 
caught  this  trick,  which,  common  enough  for  a  long 
while  among  British  speakers,  and  even  writers  of  a 
low  order,  has  been  heard  here  only  within  a  few 
years.  He  meant  that  carriages  had  as  good  a  7'ight 
as  cars  to  go  on  without  interruption,  and  that  the 
cars  had  as  much  obligation  to  stop  as  the  carriages. 
A  right  is  an  incorporeal,  rightful  possession,  and, 
consequently,  something  of  value,  which  we  strive  to 
get  and  to  keep,  except  always  when  it  is  claimed  from 
us  in  the  name  of  the  patron  saint  Patrick,  of  the 
great  State  and  the  great  city  of  our  country.  Death 
is  the  legal  punishment  of  certain  felonies.  But  we  do 
not  speak  of  the  murderer's  right  of  being  hanged. 
Yet  in  case  of  a  choice  of  two  modes  of  death,  we 
should  use  the  word,  and  speak,  for  instance,  of  the 
soldier's  right  to  be  shot  rather  than  hangred. 


SOME   BRITICISMS  179 

Sick  and  III  are  two  other  words  that  have  been 
perverted  in  general  British  usage.  Almost  all  British 
speakers  and  writers  limit  the  meaning  of  sick  to  the 
expression  of  qualmishness,  sickness  at  the  stomach, 
nausea,  and  lay  the  proper  burden  of  the  adjective 
sick  upon  the  adverb  ill.  They  sneer  at  us  for  not 
joining  in  the  robbery  and  the  imposition.  I  was  pre- 
sent once  when  a  British  merchant,  receiving  in  his 
own  house  a  Yankee  youth  at  a  little  party,  said,  in  a 
tone  that  attracted  the  attention  of  the  whole  room, 
"  Good  evening  !  We  have  n't  seen  you  for  a  long 
while.  Have  you  been  seeck  "  (the  sneer  prolonged 
the  word),  "as  you  say  in  your  country?"  "No, 
thank  you,"  said  the  other,  frankly  and  promptly, 
"  I  've  been  hill,  as  they  say  in  yours."  John  Bull, 
although  he  blushed  to  the  forehead,  had  the  good 
sense,  if  not  the  good  nature,  to  join  in  the  laugh  that 
followed  ;  but  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  he  never  ran 
another  tilt  in  that  quarter.  As  to  the  sense  in  which 
sick  is  used  by  the  best  English  writers,  there  can  be, 
of  course,  no  dispute  ;  but  I  have  seen  this  set  down 
in  a  British  critical  journal  of  high  class  as  an  "  obso- 
lete sense."  It  is  not  obsolete  even  in  modern  British 
usage.  The  Birmingham  "  Journal  "  of  August  29, 
1869,  informs  its  readers  that,  "  The  Sick  Club  ques- 
tion has  given  rise  to  another  batch  of  letters  from 
local  practitioners  of  medicine  ; "  Mrs.  Massingberd 
publishes  "  Sickness,  its  Trials  and  Blessings  "  (Lon- 
don, 1868)  ;  and  a  letter  before  me,  from  a  London 
woman  to  a  friend,  says,  "  I  am  truly  sorry  to  hear 
you  are  so  very  sick.  Do  make  haste  and  get  well." 
One  of  Matthew  Arnold's  poems  is  "  The  Sick  King 
in  Bokhara,"  in  which  are  these  lines  :  — 

"  O  King,  thou  know'st  I  liave  been  sick 
These  many  days,  and  huard  no  thing." 


180  WORDS  AND   THEIR  USES 

British  officers  have  sick  leave ;  British  invalids  keep 
a  sick  bed,  or  a  sick  room,  and  so  forth,  no  matter 
what  their  ailment.  No  one  of- them  ever  speaks  of 
ill  leave,  an  ill  room,  or  an  ill  bed.  Was  an  111  Club 
ever  heard  of  in  England  ?  The  incongruity  is  ap- 
parent, and  it  is  new-born  and  needless.  For  the  use 
of  ill  —  an  adverb  —  as  an  adjective,  thus,  an  ill  man, 
there  is  no  defence  and  no  excuse,  excejjt  the  contami- 
nation of  bad  example. 

Stop  for  stay  is  a  Briticism ;  e.  g.,  "  stop  at  'ome." 
To  stop  is  to  arrest  motion  ;  to  stay  is  to  remain  where 
motion  is  arrested.  "  I  shall  stop  at  the  Clarendon," 
says  our  British  friend, —  one  of  the  sort  that  does  not 
"  stop  at  'ome."  And  he  will  quite  surely  stop  there ; 
but  after  he  has  stopped,  whether  he  stays  there,  and 
how  long,  depend  upon  circumstances.  A  railway 
train  stops  at  many  stations,  but  it  stays  only  at  one. 

Nasty.  —  This  word,  at  best  not  well  suited  to 
dainty  lips,  is  of  late  years  shockingly  misused  by 
British  folk  who  should  be  ashamed  of  such  defiled 
English.  Thus  we  read  in  the  "  Saturday  Review  " 
or  the  "Spectator"  of  Mr.  Disraeli's  or  Mr.  Bernal 
Osborne's  making  "  a  nasty  retort ;  "  meaning  that 
the  rejoinder  was  ill-natured  or  irritating.  And  in 
Miss  Broughton's  last  novel,  "  Good-bye,  Sweetheart," 
the  same  misuse  occurs  in  more  than  one  passage. 
For  example :  — 

"  Fiddlesticks,"  replies  Scrope,  brusquely,  "  a  man  to  throw  a 
girl  over  to  whom  he  is  passionately  attached,  because  she  says 
a  few  nasty  things  to  him  ;  more  especially  (smiling  a  little 
maliciously)  when  she  has  got  into  a  habit  of  saying  nasty  things 
to  everybody."  —  Part  2,  cA.  9. 

Miss  Broughton  reproduces  the  daily  talk  of  the 
cultivated   people  for  whom  she  writes.     But   could 


SOME   BRITICISMS  181 

there  be  better  reason  for  a  man's  throwing  a  girl 
over  than  her  saying  nasty  things  ?  For  hardly  three 
other  English  words  are  so  nearly  the  same  in  mean- 
ing as  dirty ^  filthy,  and  nasty  ;  of  which  the  last  ex- 
presses the  greatest  offence  to  all  the  senses,  —  the 
quality  and  condition  of  moist  and  generally  ill-smell- 
ing filth.  This  slangy  misuse  of  the  word  is  rarely  or 
never  heard  in  the  United  States. 


CHAPTER  VII 

WORDS  THAT  ARE  NOT  WORDS 

What  is  a  word  ?  Every  one  knows.  The  most 
ignorant  child,  if  it  can  speak,  needs  no  definition  of 
word.  Probably  no  other  word  in  the  language  is  so 
rarely  referred  to  in  dictionaries.  Until  I  began  to 
write  this  chapter,  and  had  framed  a  definition  of 
word  for  myself,  I  had  never  seen  or  heard  one,  that 
I  remember.  Yet,  if  any  reader  will  shut  this  book 
here,  and  try  to  tell  exactly  what  a  word  is,  and  write 
down  his  definition  before  he  opens  the  book  again,  he 
may  find  that  the  task  is  not  so  easy  as  he  may  have 
supposed  it  to  be.  Dr.  Johnson's  definition  is,  "  a 
single  part  of  speech,"  at  the  limited  view  and  school- 
masterish  style  of  which  we  may  be  inclined  at  first 
to  smile.  Richardson's  first  definition  is,  "  anything 
spoken  or  told."  But  this  applies  equally  to  a  speech 
or  a  story.  His  second  is,  "  an  articulate  utterance 
of  the  voice,"  which  is  really  the  same  as  Worcester's, 
*'  an  articulate  sound."  But  this  will  not  do  ;  for 
haclomipivit  is  an  articulate  sound,  but  it  is  not  a 
word,  and  I  hope  never  will  be  one  in  my  language  ; 
and  /  and  you  are  not  articulate  sounds,  and  yet  they 
are  words.     Webster's  definition  is,  — 

"  An  articulate  or  vocal  sound,  or  a  combination  of 
articulate  and  vocal  sounds,  uttered  by  the  human 
voice,  and  by  custom  expressing  an  idea  or  ideas." 

Here,  plainly,  fulness  and   accuracy  of  definition 


WORDS  THAT  ARE  NOT  WORDS      183 

have  been  sought,  but  they  have  not  been  attained. 
The  definition,  considering  its  design,  is  superfluous, 
inexact,  and  incomplete.  The  whole  of  the  first  part 
of  it,  making  a  distinction  between  articulate  and 
vocal  sounds,  and  between  such  sounds  and  a  combi- 
nation of  them,  is  needless  and  fi'om  the  purpose. 
The  latter  part  of  the  definition  uses  custom  vaguely, 
and  in  the  word  idea  fails  to  include  all  that  is  re- 
quired. 

A  word  is  an  utterance  of  the  human  voice  which 
in  any  community  expresses  a  thought  or  a  thing.  If 
there  is  a  village  or  a  hamlet  where  ao  expresses  I 
love,  or  any  other  thought,  and  haho  means  bread, 
or  anything  else,  then  for  that  community,  ao  and 
baho  are  words.  But  words,  generally,  are  utterances 
which  express  thoughts  or  things  to  a  race,  a  people. 
Custom  is  not  an  essential  condition  of  wordship. 
Howell,  in  one  of  his  letters  (Book  I.,  Letter  12), 
says  of  an  Italian  town,  "  There  are  few  places  this 
side  the  Alps  better  built  and  so  well  streeted  as 
this."  Streeted  was  probably  never  used  before,  and 
nas  probably  never  been  used  since  Howell  used  it, 
two  hundred  and  forty  years  ago.  But  it  expi'essed 
his  thought  perfectly  then  to  all  English-speaking 
people,  and  does  so  now,  and  is  a  participial  adjec- 
tive correctly  formed.  It  is  unknown  to  custom,  but 
it  has  all  the  conditions  of  wordship,  and  is  a  much 
better  English  word  than  very  many  in  Webster's 
Dictionary.  And,  after  all,  Johnson's  definition  cov- 
ers the  ground.  We  must  dismiss  from  our  minds 
our  grammar-class  notion  of  a  sort  of  things,  preposi- 
tions, nouns,  adverbs,  and  articles,  the  name  of  which 
is  part-of-speech,  and  think  of  a  single  part  of  speech. 
Whatever  is  a  single  part  of  any  speech  is  a  word. 


184  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

But  as  there  are  books  that  are  not  books,  so  there 
are  words  that  are  not  words.  Most  of  them  are 
usurpers,  interlopers,  or  vulgar  pretenders  ;  some  are 
deformed  creatures,  with  only  half  a  life  in  them  ;  but 
some  of  them  are  legitimate  enough  in  their  preten- 
sions,  although  oppressive,  intolerable,  useless.  Words 
that  are  not  words  sometimes  die  spontaneously  ;  but 
many  linger,  living  a  precarious  life  on  the  outskirts 
of  society,  uncertain  of  their  position,  and  a  cause  of 
great  discomfort  to  all  right  thinking,  straightforward 
people. 

These  words-no- words  are  in  many  cases  the  conse» 
quence  of  a  misapprehension  or  whimsical  perversion 
of  some  real  word.  Sitting  at  dinner  beside  a  lady 
whom  it  was  always  a  pleasure  to  look  upon,  I  offeree, 
her  a  croquette,  which  she  declined,  adding,  in  a  con 
fidential  whisper,  "  I  am  Banting."  I  turned  witt 
surprise  in  my  face  (for  she  had  no  likeness  to  the 
obese  London  upholsterer),  and  heard  the  wai/* con- 
fession that  she  lived  in  daily  fear  lest  the  polished 
plumpness  which  so  delighted  my  eye  should  develop 
into  corpulence,  and  that  therefore  she  had  adopted 
Banting's  system  of  diet,  the  doing  of  which  she  ex- 
pressed by  the  grotesque  participle  hanting.  She  was 
not  alone  in  its  use,  I  soon  learned.  And  thus,  be- 
cause a  proper  name  happened  to  end  in  ing^  it  was 
used  as  a  participle  formed  upon  the  assumed  verb 
hcnit.  In  fact,  I  have  since  that  time  often  heard  intel- 
ligent women,  speaking  without  the  slightest  inten- 
tion of  pleasantry,  and  in  entire  simplicity  and  uncon- 
sciousness, say  of  one  or  another  of  their  friends,  "  Oh, 
she  hants"  or  "  She  has  banted  these  two  years  to 
keep  herself  down."  The  next  edition  of  Webster's 
Dictionary  will  probably  contain  a  new  verb  —  Bant, 
to  eschew  fat-producing  food. 


WORDS  THAT  ARE  NOT  WORDS     185 

Another  example  of  this  mode  of  forming  words 
is  afforded  by  the  following  political  advertisement, 
which  I  found  in  a  Brooklyn  newspaper  :  — 

"  Notice.  —  I  am  intercessed  by  Mr. and  certain  of  his 

friends  to  withdraw  my  claims  for  the  supervisorsliip  of  this 
Ward.  I  have  only  to  say  to  the  citizens  of  the  13th  that  I  ruu 
for  the  office  upon  the  recommendation  and  support  of  many 
influential  citizens,  amounting  to  me  as  much  as  is  claimed  by 
the  so-called  regularly  nominated  candidate.  I  shall  run  for  the 
office  as  Democratic  Supervisor,  despite  intercessions  or  brow- 
beating, and  if  elected  shall  make  it  my  sole  duty  to  attend  to 
the  interests  of  property-holders  and  rights  of  the  country. 

"J 3  K G." 

I  have  given  the  advertisement  entire,  because  it 
shows  that  the  writer  is  a  man  of  intelligence  and 
some  education  ;  and  yet  such  a  man  not  only  sup- 
poses that  intercession  means  simply  enti-eaty,  —  los- 
ing sight  entirely  of  the  vicarious  signification  which 
is  its  essential  significance  (its  primitive  meaning 
being,  going  between),  —  but  that  it  is  from  a  verb 
intercess  ;  or  else  he  boldly  forms  intercess  from  i7i- 
tercession,  and  uses  it  apparently  without  the  least 
hesitation  or  compunction.  His  honesty  of  purpose 
should  win  him  forgiveness  for  less  venial  errors ;  but 
at  this  rate,  and  with  this  style  of  word-formation, 
where  shall  we  stop  ?  For  intercess,  although  it  is 
yet  rather  raw  and  new,  is  as  good  a  word  as  others 
which  are  in  not  infrequent  use  among  people  of 
no  less  intelligence  and  general  information  than  his. 
In  this  chapter  some  of  these  words  will  be  examined, 
and  also  some  others  against  which  purism  has  raised 
objections  which  do  not  seem  to  be  well  taken. 

Adjectives  are  used  as  substantives  with  clearness 
and  force  when  they  thus  give  substantive  form  to  an 
abstract  quality,  as,  Seek  the  good,  eschew  the  evil ; 


186  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

the  excellent  of  the  earth  ;  speak  well  of  the  dead. 
But  the  use  of  the  adjective  part  of  a  compound-desig- 
nating phrase  as  a  noun  is  to  be  avoided  upon  peril 
of  vulgarity  and  absurdity,  and  generally  produces  a 
word-no-word  of  the  most  monstrous  and  ridiculous 
sort.  For  example,  a  large  gilded  sign  in  Wall  Street 
announces  that  Messrs.  A.  &  B.  are  "  Dealers  in  Gov- 
ernments ;  "  but  if  any  gentleman  in  want  of  the  arti- 
cles should  step  in  and  ask  to  be  supplied  with  a 
republic  and  two  monarchies,  he  would  then  probably 
learn  that  Messrs.  A.  &  B.  dealt  not  in  governments, 
but  in  government  securities.  In  like  manner  the 
editor  of  a  Southern  paper,  carried  out  of  the  orbit  of 
high  journalistic  reserve  by  the  attractions  of  two 
ladies  unknown  to  fame,  begins  thus  an  article  in  their 
glory :  — 

"  For  the  first  time  during  the  existence  of  this  paper  we 
notice  a  theatrical  representation  editorially.  We  generally 
leave  that  matter  to  our  locals  ;  but  really  the  Worral  sis- 
ters   ! " 

What  a  "  local "  is  might  well  puzzle  any  reader 
who  had  not  the  technical  knowledge  that  would  ena- 
ble him  to  see  that  it  is  "  short  "  for  local  reporter, 
itself  an  incorrect  name  for  a  reporter  of  local  news. 
Beguiling  the  time  by  reading  the  advertising  cards 
in  a  railway  station  where  I  awaited  a  belated  train, 
my  eye  was  caught  by  the  following  sentence  in  one 
of  them  :  — 

"  The  Southern  States  is  without  exception  the  most  complete 
six-hole  premium  ever  made." 

What  a  premium  was  I  knew,  but  a  six-hole  pre- 
mium, and,  still  more,  a  complete  six-hole  premium, 
was  beyond  the  range  even  of  my  conjecture,  imless, 
perhaps,   it  might  be   a  flute  given   as  a  reward  of 


WORDS  THAT  ARE  NOT  WORDS     187 

merit.  But,  reading  farther,  I  found  that  the  adver- 
tisers called  public  attention  not  only  to  their  South- 
ern States,  but  to  their  "  Dixie  for  wood,  with  extended 
fire-box.  A  perfect  premium  !  "  This,  and  the  wood- 
cut of  a  cooking  stove,  led  me  step  by  step  to  the  ap- 
prehension of  the  fact  that  these  inventors  in  language, 
as  well  as  in  househokl  articles,  had  produced  a  uten- 
sil for  the  kitchen,  which,  having  received  a  premium 
for  it,  they  called,  rightly  enough,  their  premium 
stove  ;  and  that  thereafter  they  called  their  stoves, 
and  perhajis  all  other  good  stoves,  if  any  others  than 
theirs  could  be  good,  jjremiums,  and  consequently  the 
best  and  largest  of  them  all  a  complete  six-hole  pre- 
mium. The  height  of  absurdity  wliich  they  thus 
reached  is  a  sufficient  warning,  without  further  re- 
mark, against  the  substantive  use  of  adjectives  of 
which  they  furnished  so  bewildering  an  example. 

Authoress,  Poetess.  —  These  words  and  others 
of  their  sort  have  been  condemned  by  writers  for 
whose  taste  and  judgment  I  have  great  respect ;  but 
although  the  words  are  not  very  lovely,  it  would  seem 
that  their  right  to  a  place  in  the  language  cannot 
be  denied.  The  distinction  of  the  female  from  the 
male  by  the  termination  ess  is  one  of  the  oldest  and 
best-established  usages  of  English  speech.  MistresSy 
goddess,  prioress,  deaconess,  shepherdess,  heiress, 
sempstress,  traitress  are  examples  that  will  occur  to 
every  reader.  Sir  Thomas  Clialoner,  in  his  transla- 
tion of  Erasmus's  "  Praise  of  Folly  "  (an  excellent 
piece  of  English),  makes  a  feminine  noun,  and  a  good 
one,  by  adding  ess  to  a  verb  — foster. 

"  Further,  as  concernyng  my  bringynge  up,  I  am  not  envious 
that  Jupiter,  the  great  god,  had  a  goat  to  his/osires-s-." 

Gower  says  that  Clytemnestra  was  "  of  her  own 


188  WORDS  AND   THEIR   USES 

lord  mordrice.'^  Fuller  uses  bulldress  and  intru* 
dress,  Sir  Philip  Sidney  captainess,  Holland  (Plu- 
tarch) Jlattress,  Sylvester  soveraintess,  and  Ben 
Jonson  victress.  And  could  we  afford  to  lose  Mil' 
ton's 

"  Thee,  chauntress,  oft  the  woods  among 
I  woo,  to  hear  thy  even  song  "  ? 

Indeed,  these  examples  and  this  defence  seem  quite 
superfluous.  There  can  be  no  reasonable  objection 
made,  only  one  of  individual  taste,  to  actress,  author- 
ess, poetess,  and  even  to  scidptress  and  paintress. 

Donate.  —  I  need  hardly  say  that  this  word  is 
utterly  abominable  —  one  that  any  lover  of  simple 
honest  English  cannot  hear  with  patience  and  with- 
out offence.  It  has  been  formed  by  some  presuming 
and  ignorant  person  from  donation,  and  is  much  such 
a  word  as  vocate  would  be  from  vocation,  orate  from 
oration,  or  gradate  from  gradation  ;  and  this  when 
we  have  give,  jiresent,  grant,  confer,  endow,  hequeath, 
devise,  with  which  to  express  the  act  of  transferring 
possession  in  all  its  possible  varieties.  The  first  of 
these  will  answer  the  purpose,  in  most  cases,  better 
than  any  one  of  the  others,  and  donation  itself  is  not 
among  our  best  words.  If  any  man  thinks  that  he 
and  his  gift  are  made  to  seem  more  imposing  because 
the  latter  is  called  a  donation,  which  he  donates,  let 
him  remember  that  when  Antonio  requires  that  the 
wealthy  Shylock  shall  leave  all  he  dies  possessed  of 
to  Lorenzo  and  Jessica,  he  stipulates  that  "  he  do 
record  a  gift "  of  it,  and  that  Portia,  in  consequence, 
says,  "  Clerk,  draw  a  deed  of  gift ; "  and  more,  that 
the  writers  of  the  simplest  and  noblest  English  that 
has  been  written  called  the  Omnipotent  "  the  Giver 
of  every  good  and  perfect  gift."     But  there  are  some 


WORDS  THAT  ARE  NOT  WORDS      189 

folk  who  would  like  to  call  liim  the  Great  Donater 
because  he  donates  every  good  and  perfect  donation. 
If  they  must  express  giving  by  an  Anglicized  form 
of  the  Latin  dono^  it  were  better  that  they  used  do- 
nation as  a  verb.  So  Cotton  writes  (Montaigne's 
Essays,  I.  359),  "  They  used  to  collation  between 
meals."  This  is  better  than  "  They  used  to  collate 
between  meals." 

Enquire,  Enclose,  Endorse.  —  These  words  have 
been  condemned  by  some  writers  on  the  ground  that 
they  are  respectively  from  the  Latin  inqulro,  includo, 
and  in  dorsum,  and  should,  therefore,  be  written 
inquire,  inclose,  and  indorse.  This  is  an  error.  They 
are,  to  be  sure,  of  Latin  origin,  but  remotely ;  they 
come  to  us  directly  from  the  old  French  eiiquerre, 
enclos,  and  endorser.  For  centuries  they  appear  in 
our  literature  with  the  prefix  en.  That  Johnson 
gives  this  class  of  words  with  the  prefix  in  must  be 
attributed  to  a  tendency,  not  uncommon,  but  not 
healthy,  to  follow  words  of  Norman  or  French  origin 
back  to  their  Latin  roots,  and  to  adopt  a  spelling 
in  conformity  to  these,  in  preference  to  that  which 
pertains  to  them  as  representatives  of  an  important 
and  inherent  element  in  the  formation  of  the  English 
language.  The  best  lexicographers  and  philologists 
now  discourage  this  tendency,  and  adhere  to  the  forms 
which  pertain  to  the  immediate  origin  of  derived 
words.  But  it  must  be  confessed  that  the  class  of 
words  in  question  is  notably  defiant  of  analogy,  and 
very  much  in  need  of  regulation.  For  instance,  en- 
quire, enquiry,  inquest,  inquisition.  No  one  would 
think  of  writing  enquest,  and  enquisitibn.  The  dis- 
crepancy is  of  long  standing,  and  must  be  borne, 
except   by  those  who  choose  to  avoid  it  by  writing 


190  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

inquire  for  the  sake  of  uniformity  ;  condemnation  of 
which  may  be  left  to  purists. 

Enthused.  —  This  ridiculous  word  is  an  Ameri- 
canism in  vogue  in  the  southern  part  of  the  United 
States.  I  never  heard  or  saw  it  used,  or  heard  of 
its  use,  by  any  person  born  and  bred  north  of  the 
Potomac.  The  Baltimore  "  American "  furnishes 
the  following  example  of  its  use  :  — 

"  It  seems  that  this  State,  so  quickly  enthused  by  the  gener- 
ous and  loyal  cause  of  emancipation,  has  grown  weary  of  virtu- 
ous effort,  and  again  stands  still." 

I  shall  not  conceal  the  fact  that  the  following 
defence  might  be  set  up,  but  not  fairly,  for  enthuse. 
Ev^ovo-iacr/Aos  (^Entliousiasmos)  was  formed  by  the 
Greeks  from  ev6ov<i  (^enthous),  a  contracted  form  of 
cv^eos  (^entheos)^  meaning  in  or  with  God,  i.  e.,  di- 
vinely inspired.  From  the  Greek  adjective  enthous, 
an  English  verb,  enthuse  might  be  properly  formed. 
But,  with  no  disrespect  to  Southern  scholarship,  we 
may  safely  say  that  enthuse  was  not  made  by  the 
illogical  process  of  going  to  the  Greek  root  of  a 
Greek  word  from  which  an  English  noun  had  al- 
ready been  formed.  It  was  plainly  reached  by  the 
backward  process  of  making  some  kind  of  verb  from 
the  noun  enthusiasm,  as  donate  was  formed  from 
donation.  If  our  Southern  friends  must  have  a  new 
word  to  express  the  agitation  of  soul  to  which  this 
one  would  seem  to  indicate  that  they  are  peculiarly 
subject,  let  them  say  that  they  are  enthusiasmed. 
The  French,  who  have  the  word  enthousiasme,  have 
also  the  verb  enthousiasmer,  and,  of  course,  the  per- 
fect participle  enthousiasme,  enthusiasmed,  which  are 
correctly  formed.  But  while  we  have  such  words  as 
stirred,  aroused,  inspired,  excited,  transported,  rav- 


WORDS  THAT  ARE  NOT  WORDS      191 

ished,  intoxicated^  is  it  worth  while  to  go  farther  aud 
fare  worse  for  such  a  word,  as  entliuscd,  or  even  eiv- 
thtisiasmed  f 

Etc,  Etc.  —  This  convenient  sign  is  very  frequently 
read  "  and  so  forth,  and  so  forth  ;  "  aud  what  is  worse, 
many  persons  who  read  it  properly,  ct  cetera^  regard 
it  and  use  it  as  a  more  elegant  equivalent  of  "  and  so 
forth  ;  "  but  it  is  no  such  thing.  Et  cetera  is  merely 
Latin  for  and  the  rest,  and  is  properly  used  in  sched- 
ules or  statements  after  an  account  given  of  particu- 
lar things,  to  include  other  things  too  unimportant 
and  too  numerous  for  particular  mention.  But  the 
phrase  and  so  forth  has  quite  another  meaning,  i.  e., 
and  as  before  so  after,  in  the  same  strain.  It  implies 
the  continuation  of  a  story  in  accordance  with  the 
beginning.  Sometimes  the  story  is  actually  continued 
in  the  relation,  at  other  times  it  is  not.  Thus  we 
may  say.  And  so  forth  he  told  him  —  thus  and  so  ;  or, 
after  the  relation  of  the  main  part  of  a  story  we  may 
add.  And  so  forth ;  meaning  that  matters  went  on 
thereafter  as  before.  This  phrase  is  one  of  the  oldest 
and  most  useful  in  the  language.  Gower  thus  used 
it  in  his  "  Confessio  Amantis,"  written  nearly  six 
hundred  years  ago  :  — 

"  So  as  he  mighte  [he]  tolde  tho  [then] 
Unto  Ulixes  all  the  cas, 
How  that  Circes  his  nioder  was, 
And  no  forth  said  him  every  dele 
How  that  his  moder  grete  him  wele." 

Fellowship  used  as  a  verb  (for  example,  "  An 
attempt  to  disfellowshij)  an  evil,  but  to  fellowsJiip  the 
evil-doer  ")  is  an  abomination  which  has  been  hith- 
erto regarded  as  of  American  origin.  It  is  not  often 
heard  or  written  among  people  whose  language  is  in 


192  WORDS  AND   THEIR  USES 

other  respects  a  fair  example  of  the  English  spoken 
in  "  America ;  "  but  Mr.  Bartlett  justly  says  in  his 
"  Dictionary  of  Americanisms  "  (a  useful  and  interest- 
ing, although  a  very  misleading  book),  that  it  "appears 
with  disgusting  frequency  in  the  reports  of  ecclesias- 
tical conventions,  and  in  the  religious  newspapers  gen- 
erally." The  conventions,  however,  and  the  news- 
papers are  those  of  the  least  educated  sects.  To  this 
use  of  fellowship)  it  would  be  a  perfect  parallel  to  say 
that,  fifteen  years  ago,  the  monarchs  of  Europe  would 
not  kingship  with  Louis  Napoleon.  There  is  no  ex- 
cuse of  need  for  the  bringing  in  of  this  barbarism. 
Fellow,  like  mate,  may  be  used  as  a  verb  as  well  as  a 
noun  ;  and  it  is  as  well  to  say,  I  will  not  fellow  with 
him,  as  I  will  not  mate  v/ith  him.  The  authority  of 
eminent  example  is  not  needed  for  such  a  use  of  fel- 
low ;  but  those  who  feel  the  want  of  it  may  find  it 
in  Shakespeare's  plays  and  in  "  Piers  Ploughman's 
Vision  "  by  referring  to  Johnson's  and  Richardson's 
dictionaries,  in  both  of  which  fellow  is  given  as  a  verb. 
Words  ending  in  sAip  express  a  condition  or  state,  and 
felloivshiq)  means  the  condition  or  state  of  those  who 
are  fellows,  or  who  fellow  with  each  other.  But  the 
use  of  this  word  as  a  verb  did  not  begin  in  "  Amer- 
ica ;  "  witness  the  following  passages  from  the  "  Morte 
d' Arthur  :  "  — 

"  How  Syr  Galahad  faught  wyth  Syr  Tristram,  and  how  Syr 
tristram  yelded  hym  and  promysed  to  felaushyp  with  lancelot." 

"  And,  sire,  I  promyse  you,"  said  Sir  Tristram,  as  soone  as  I 
may  I  will  see  Sir  launcelot,  and  enfelauship  me  with  hym,  for  of 
alls  the  knyghtes  of  the  world  I  moost  desyre  his  felauship." 
Morte  d' Arthur,  Ed.  Southey,  vol.  i.  pp.  xix,  287. 

This  was  written  a.  d.  1469,  and  the  verbs  fellow- 
ship and  enfellowship  were  reprinted  in  all  editions, 


WORDS  THAT   ARE   NOT   WORDS  193 

notwithstanding  numerous  and  important  moderniza- 
tions and  corrections  of  the  text,  down  to  that  of  1G34, 
which  Mr.  Wright  has  made  the  basis  of  his  excellent 
edition  of  1858.  If  the  word  could  be  justified  by 
origin  and  use,  it  has  them,  of  sufficient  antiquity  and 
high  authority.  And  as  to  its  being  an  Americanism, 
it  was  in  use,  like  many  other  words,  so-called,  before 
Columbus  set  sail  on  the  voyage  that  ended  in  the 
unexpected  discovery  of  the    new  continent. 

Forward,  Upward,  Downward,  Toward,  and 
other  compounds  of  ward  (which  is  the  Anglo-Saxon 
suffix  iveard,  meaning  in  the  direction  of,  over  against), 
have  been  written  also  yorivards,  upinards,  and  so 
forth,  from  a  period  of  remote  antiquity,  extending 
even  to  the  Anglo-Saxon  form  of  the  language.  But 
there  seems  hardly  a  doubt  that  the  s  is  a  corruption 
as  well  as  a  superfluity.  The  weight  of  the  best  usage 
is  on  the  side  of  the  form  without  the  s.  "  Speak  to 
Israel  that  they  go  forward.^^  (Exodus  xiv.  15.) 
"  For  we  will  not  inherit  with  them  on  yonder  side 
Jordan,  ovforivard;  because  our  inheritance  is  fallen 
to  us  on  this  side  Jordan  easttoard^  (Numbers 
xxxii.  19.)  No  reason  can  be  given  for  using  for- 
wards and  hackvKirds  which  woidd  not  apply  to  east- 
loards  and  westioards,  which  no  one  thinks  of  using. 
Granting  that  both  forms  are  correct,  the  avoiding  of 
the  hissing  termination,  which  is  one  of  the  few  re- 
proaches of  our  language,  is  a  good  reason  for  adher- 
ing to  the  simple,  unmodified  compound  in  ward. 

Gent  and  Pants.  —  Let  these  words  go  together, 
like  the  things  they  signify.  The  one  always  wears 
the  other. 

Gubernatorial.  —  This  clumsy  piece  of  verbal 
pomposity    should    be    thrust    out   of    use,   and    that 


194  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

speedily.  While  the  chief  officers  of  States  are 
called  governors,  and  not  gubernators,  we  may  better 
speak  of  the  governor's  house  and  of  the  governor's 
room,  than  of  the  gubernatorial  mansion  and  the  gu- 
bernatorial chamber ;  and  why  that  which  relates  to 
government  should  be  called  gubernatorial  rather  than 
governmental,  except  for  the  sake  of  being  at  once 
pedantic,  uncouth,  and  outlandish,  it  would  be  hard 
to  tell. 

Hydropathy.  —  This  word,  and  electropathy^  and 
all  of  the  same  sort,  should  also  be  scouted  out  of 
sight  and  hearing.  They  are  absolutely  without  mean- 
ing, and,  in  their  composition,  are  fine  examples  of 
pretentious  ignorance.  Hahnemann  called  the  system 
of  medicine  which  he  advocated  homoeopathy,  because 
its  method  was  to  cure  disease  by  drugs  which  would 
cause  a  like  Qomoios)  disease  or  suffering  (^pathos). 
The  older  system  was  naturally  called  by  him  (it  was 
never  before  so  called  by  its  practisers)  allopathy, 
because  it  worked  by  medicines  which  set  up  an  ac- 
tion counter  to,  different  from  Qallos^,  the  disease. 
These  are  good  technical  Greek  derivatives.  And 
by  just  as  much  as  they  are  good  and  reasonable,  are 
hydro2)athy  and  electrojKithy  bad  and  foolish.  Why 
should  water-c?^re  be  called  water-fZisease  f  why  elec- 
tric-cure, electric-disease  ?  The  absurdity  of  these 
words  is  shown  by  translating  them.  They  are  plainly 
sprung  from  the  desire  of  those  who  practise  the 
water-cure  and  the  electric-cure  to  be  reckoned  with 
the  legitimate  ^ja^Aies.  And  the  "  hydropathists  " 
and  "  electropathists  "  are  not  alone.  I  saw  once,  be- 
fore a  little  shop  with  some  herbs  in  the  window,  a 
sign  which  ran  thus  :  — 

INDIAN 
OPATHIST. 


WORDS   THAT   ARE   NOT   AVORDS  195 

I  was  puzzled  for  a  moment  to  divine  what  an  opa- 
thist  might  be.  But  of  course  I  saw  in  the  next  mo- 
ment that  the  vendei-  of  the  herbs  in  the  little  shop, 
thinking-  that  his  practice  had  as  good  a  right  as  any 
other  to  a  big  name,  and  deceived  by  the  accent  which 
some  persons  give  to  homa'opathy  and  allopathy^  had 
called  his  practice  Indian-Opathy,  and  himself  an  In- 
dian-Opathist.  He  was  not  one  whit  more  absurd 
than  the  self-styled  "  hydropathist "  and  "  electro- 
pathist."  As  gi'eat  a  blunder  was  made  by  an  apoth- 
ecary, who,  wishing  to  give  a  name  to  a  new  remedy 
for  cold  and  cough,  advertised  it  widely  as  coldine. 
Now,  the  termination  ine  is  of  Latin  origin,  and 
means  having  the  quality  of  ;  as  metaline^  having  the 
quality  of  metal ;  alkaline,  having  the  quality  of  al- 
kali ;  canine,  having  the  qualities  of  a  dog ;  asinine, 
those  of  an  ass.  And  so  this  apothecary,  wishing  to 
make  a  name  that  would  sound  as  fine  as  glycerine, 
and  stearine,  and  the  like,  actually  advertised  his 
remedy  for  a  cold  as  something  that  had  the  quality  of 
a  cold.  The  rudest  peasants  do  better  than  that  by  lan- 
guage, for  they  are  content  with  their  mother  tongue. 
A  gentleman  who  was  visiting  one  of  the  remotest  rural 
districts  of  England  met  a  barefooted  girl  carrying 
a  pail  of  water.  Floating  on  the  top  of  the  water 
was  a  disc  of  wood  a  little  less  in  diameter  than  the 
rim  of  the  pail.  "  What 's  that,  my  lass?  "  he  asked. 
"  Thot  ?  "  (with  surprise)  ;  "  why,  thot  's  a  stiller.''^ 
It  was  a  simple  but  effective  contrivance  for  stilling 
the  water  as  it  was  carried.  The  word  is  not  in  the 
dictionaries,  but  they  contain  no  better  English.  It 
is  only  when  men  wish  to  be  big  and  fine,  to  seem  to 
know  more  than  they  do  know,  and  to  be  something 
that  they  are  not,  that  they  make  such  absurd  words  as 
Jiydropathy,  electropathy,  indianopathy,  and  coldine. 


196  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

IzE  and  1st,  two  useful  affixes  for  the  expression  of 
action  and  agency,  are  often  ignorantly  added  when 
they  are  entirely  superfluous,  and  when  they  are  incon- 
gruous with  the  stem.  They  are  Greek  terminations, 
and  cannot  propei-ly  be  added  to  Anglo-Saxon  words. 
1st  is  the  substantive  form,  ize  the  verbal.  Among 
the  monsters  in  this  form  none  is  more  frequently  met 
with  than  jeopardize  —  a  foolish  and  intolerable  word, 
which  has  no  rightful  place  in  the  language,  although 
even  such  a  writer  as  Charles  Reade  thus  uses  it :  —  „ 

•'  He  drew  in  the  horns  of  speculation,  and  went  on  in  the  old, 
safe  routine  ;  and  to  the  restless  activity  that  had  jeopardized 
the  firm  succeeded  a  strange  torpidity." 

Certain  verbs  have  been  formed  from  nouns  and  ad- 
jectives by  the  addition  of  ise,  or  properly  ize  ;  as,  for 
example,  equal,  equalize;  civil,  civilize;  patron,  pa- 
tronize, ^nt  jeopardize  has  no  such  claims  to  tolera- 
tion or  respect.  It  is  formed  by  adding  ize  to  a  verb 
of  long  standing  in  the  language,  and  which  means  to 
put  in  peril ;  and  jeopardize,  if  it  means  anything, 
means  nothing  more  or  less. 

Experimentalize  is  a  word  of  the  same  character  as 
the  foregoing.  It  has  no  rightful  place  in  the  lan- 
guage, and  is  both  uncouth  and  pretentious.  The  ter- 
mination ize  is  not  to  be  tacked  indiscriminately  to 
any  word  in  the  language,  verbs  and  adverbs  as  well 
as  adjectives  and  nouns,  for  the  purpose  of  making 
new  verbs  that  are  not  needed.  It  has  a  meaning, 
and  that  meaning  seems  to  be  continuity  of  action ; 
certainly  action,  and  action  which  is  not  momentary. 
Thus,  equalize,  to  make  equal ;  naturalize,  to  make  as 
if  natural ;  civilize,  to  make  civil ;  so  with  moralize, 
legalize,  humanize,  etc.  But  the  people  who  use  ex- 
perimentalize^ use  it  in  the  sense,  to  try  experiments. 


WORDS  THAT  ARE  NOT  WORDS     197 

Experiment,  however,  is  both  noun  and  verb,  and  will 
serve  all  purposes  not  better  served  by  try  and  trial. 

Controversialist,  conversationalist,  and  agricultural- 
ist, too  frequently  heard,  are  inadmissible  for  reasons 
like  to  those  given  against  expemmentalize.  The 
proper  words  are  controvertist,  conversationist,  and 
agricxdturist.  The  others  have  no  proper  place  in 
the  English  vocabulary. 

The  ridiculous  effect  of  the  slang  words  shootisty 
stabhist,  toalkist,  and  the  like,  is  produced  by  the  in- 
congruity of  adding  ist  to  verbs  of  Teutonic  origin. 
£Jr,  the  Anglo-Saxon  sign  of  the  doer  of  a  thing,  is 
incorrectly  affixed  to  such  words  as  photograj)h  and 
telegraph,  which  should  give  us  photographist  and 
telegraphist ;  as  we  say,  correctly,  paragraj^hist,  not 
paragrapher  ;  although  the  latter  would  have  the  sup- 
port of  such  words  as  geographer  and  hiographer^ 
which  are  firmly  fixed  in  the  language. 

Petroleum.  —  This  word  may  be  admitted  as  per- 
fectly legitimate,  but  it  is  one  of  a  class  which  is  doing 
injury  to  the  language.  Petroleum  means  merely 
rock  oil.  In  it  the  two  corresponding  Latin  words, 
petra  and  oleum,,  are  only  put  together  ;  and  we,  most 
of  us,  use  the  compound  without  knowing  what  it  means. 
Now  there  is  no  good  reason,  or  semblance  o^  one,  why 
we  should  use  a  pure  Latin  compound  of  four  syllables 
to  express  that  which  is  better  expressed  in  an  English 
one  of  two.  The  language  is  full  of  words  compounded 
of  two  or  more  simple  ones,  and  which  are  used  with- 
out a  thought  of  their  being  themselves  other  than 
simple  words  —  chestnut,  walnut,  acorn,  household, 
husbandman,  manhood,  witchcraft,  shepherd,  sheriff, 
anon,  alone,  ivheehcright,  toward,  forward,  and  the 
like.     The  power  to  form  such  words  is  an  element  of 


198  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

•wealth  and  strength  in  a  language :  and  every  word 
got  up  for  the  occasion  out  of  the  Latin  or  the  Greek 
lexicon,  when  a  possible  English  compound  would  serve 
the  same  purpose,  is  a  standing  but  unjust  reproach 
to  the  language  —  a  false  imputation  of  both  weakness 
and  inflexibility.  The  English  out-take  is  much  better 
than  the  Latin  compound  by  which  it  has  been  sup- 
planted —  except.  And  why  should  we  call  our  bank- 
side  towns  riparian  f  In  dropping  ivanhope  we  have 
thrown  away  a  word  for  which  despair  is  not  an  equi- 
valent ;  and  the  place  of  truth-like  or  true-seeming 
would  be  poorly  filled  by  the  word  which  some  very 
elegant  people  are  seeking  to  foist  upon  us  —  vraisem- 
hlable.  If  those  who  have  given  us  petroleum  for  rock- 
oil  had  had  the  making  of  our  language  in  past  times, 
our  evergreens  would  have  been  called  sempervirids. 

Practitioner  is  an  unlovely  intruder,  which  has 
slipped  into  the  English  language  through  the  physi- 
cian's gate.  We  have  no  word  p)ractition  to  be  made 
a  noun  of  agency  by  the  suffix  er  or  ist.  But  either 
'practitioner  or  practitionist  means  only  one  who  prac- 
tises, a  practiser.  Physicians  speak  of  their  practice 
and  of  the  practice  of  medicine,  and  in  the  next  breath 
call  a  medical  man  a  practitioner.  The  dictionary 
makers  g\\e  practise  as  the  stem  of  practitioner  —  it  is 
difficidt  to  see  why.  The  word  is  evidently  the  French 
praticien,  which  has  been  Anglified  first  by  distortion, 
and  then  by  an  incongruous  addition,  in  the  hope  of 
attaining  what  was  unattainable  —  a  word  meaning 
something  bigger  and  finer  than  is  meant  by  the  sim- 
ple, and  correct  form  practiser. 

Presidential.  —  This  adjective,  which  is  used 
among  us  now  more  frequently  than  any  other  not 
vituperative,  laudatory,  or  boastful,  is  not  a  legitimate 


WORDS  THAT  ARE  NOT  WORDS     199 

word.  Carelessness  or  ignorance  has  saddled  it  with 
an  i,  which  is  "  on  the  wrong  horse."  It  belongs  to  a 
sort  of  adjectives  which  are  formed  from  substantives 
by  the  addition  of  al.  For  example,  incident,  inci- 
dental;  orient,  oriental;  regiment,  regimental;  ex- 
periment, experimental.  When  the  noun  ends  in  ce, 
euphony  and  ease  of  utterance  require  the  modification 
of  the  sound  of  al  into  that  of  ial ;  as  office,  official ; 
consequence,  conseqiiential ;  commerce,  commei'cial. 
But  we  might  as  well  say  jjarential,  monumential,  and 
governmential,  as  2^^'cside7itial.  The  proper  form  is 
presidental,  as  that  of  the  adjectives  formed  upon 
tangent  and  exponent  is  tangental  and  exiJonental. 
Presidential,  tangential,  and  exponential  are  a  trin- 
ity of  monsters  which,  although  they  have  not  been 
lovely  in  their  lives,  should  yet  in  their  death  be  not 
divided. 

Tangential  and  exjionential,  it  is  plain,  were  incor- 
rectly made  up  by  some  mathematician  ;  and  mathe- 
maticians, however  exact  they  may  be  in  their  scientific 
work,  are  frequently  at  fault  in  their  formation  of 
words  and  phrases.  These  words  and  presidential  are 
the  only  examples  of  their  kind  which  have  received 
the  recognition,  and  have  been  stamped  with  the  au- 
thority, even  of  dictionary  makers  ;  which  recognition 
and  stamp  of  authority  mean  simply  that  the  diction- 
ary makers  have  found  the  words  somewhere,  and  have 
added  them  to  the  heterogeneous  swarm  upon  their 
pages.  Euphony,  no  less  than  analogy,  cries  out  for 
the  correct  forms,  presidental,  tangejital,  and  ejpo- 
nental.  The  rule  of  analogy  is  far  from  being  abso- 
lute ;  but  if  analogy  may  not  be  reasoned  from  in 
etymology  (although  not  always  as  the  ultima  ratio^, 
language  must  needs  be  abandoned  to  the  popular 


200  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

caprice  of  the  moment,  and  we  must  admit  that,  in 
speech,  whatever  is,  at  any  time,  in  any  place,  among 
whatever  speakers,  is  right. 

The  phrase  2}^"^sidenti.al  camjjaign  is  a  blatant 
Americanism,  and  is  a  good  example  of  what  has  been 
well  styled  ^  "  that  inflamed  newspaper  English  which 
some  people  describe  as  being  eloquence."  Is  it  not 
time  that  we  had  done  with  this  nauseous  talk  about 
campaigns,  and  standard  bearers,  and  glorious  victo- 
ries, and  all  the  bloated  army -bumming  bombast  which 
is  so  rife  for  the  six  months  preceding  an  election  ? 
To  read  almost  any  one  of  our  political  papers  during 
a  canvass  is  enough  to  make  one  sick  and  sorry.  The 
calling  a  canvass  a  campaign  is  not  defensible  as  a 
use  of  metaphor,  because,  first,  no  metaphor  is  called 
for,  and  last,  this  one  is  entirely  out  of  keejjing.  We 
could  do  our  political  talking  much  better  in  simple 
English.  One  of  the  great  needs  of  the  day,  in  regard 
to  language,  is  the  purging  it  of  the  prurient  and  pre- 
tentious metaphors  which  have  broken  out  all  over  it, 
and  the  getting  plain  people  to  say  plain  things  in  a 
plain  way.  An  election  has  no  manner  of  likeness  to 
a  campaign  or  a  battle.  It  is  not  even  a  contest  in 
which  the  stronger  and  more  dexterous  party  is  the 
winner  :  it  is  a  mere  comparison,  a  counting,  in  which 
the  bare  fact  that  one  party  is  the  more  numerous 
puts  it  in  power,  if  it  will  only  come  up  and  be 
counted  ;  to  insure  which,  a  certain  time  is  spent  by 
each  party  in  belittling  and  reviling  the  candidates  of 
its  opponents,  and  in  magnifying  and  lauding  its  own ; 
and  this  is  the  canvass,  at  the  likening  of  which  to  a 

^  In  The  Nation,  a  paper  which  is  doing  much,  I  hope,  at 
once  to  sober  and  to  elevate  the  tone  both  of  our  journalism  and 
our  politics. 


WORDS   THAT   ARE   NOT   WORDS  201 

campaign  every  honest  soldier  might  reasonably  take 
offence.  The  loss  of  an  election  is  sure  to  be  attrib- 
uted to  various  causes  by  the  losers  ;  but  the  only 
and  the  simple  and  sufficient  cause  is,  that  more  men 
chose  to  vote  against  them  than  with  them  ;  and  as  to 
the  why  of  the  why,  it  is  either  conviction,  or  friend- 
ship, or  interest,  with  which  all  the  meeting  and  pa- 
rading, and  bawling  and  shrieking,  of  the  previous 
three  or  four  months  has  nothing  whatever  to  do.  It 
will  be  well  for  the  political  morality  and  the  mental 
tone  of  our  people  when  they  are  brought  to  see  this 
matter  as  it  is,  simply  of  itself  ;  and  one  very  efficient 
mode  of  enabling  them  to  do  so  w^ould  be  for  journals 
of  character  and  men  of  sense  to  write  and  speak  of  it 
in  plain  language,  calling  a  spade  a  spade,  instead  of 
using  "  that  inflamed  English  "  which  is  now  its  com- 
mon vehicle,  and  which  is  so  contagious  and  so  cor- 
rupting, —  so  contagious,  and  so  corrupting,  indeed, 
that  I  am  not  fond  enough  to  hope  that  anything  said 
here,  even  were  it  said  with  more  reason  and  stronger 
persuasion  than  I  can  use,  will  unsettle  any  fixed  habit 
of  speech  in  my  readers.  I  merely  tell  them  what,  in 
my  judgment,  it  is  right  and  best  to  say,  knowing  in 
my  heart,  all  the  while,  that  they,  or  most  of  them,  will 
go  on  speaking  as  they  hear  those  around  them  speak, 
as  they  will  act  as  they  see  those  around  them  acting. 
People  do  not  learn  good  English  or  good  manners  by 
verbal  instruction  received  after  adolescence.  Every 
man  is  like  the  apostle  Peter  in  one  respect  —  that  his 
tongue  bewrays  him. 

Proven,  which  is  frequently  used  now  by  lawyers 
vnd  journalists,  should,  perhaps,  be  ranked  among 
words  that  are  not  words.  Those  who  use  it  seem  to 
fchink  that  it  means  something  moi'C,  or  other,  than  the 


202  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

word  for  whicli  it  is  a  mere  Lowland  Scotch  and  North 
of  England  provincialism.  Proved  is  the  past  parti- 
ciple of  the  verb  to  prove^  and  should  be  used  by  all 
who  wish  to  speak  English. 

Reliable.  —  Before  giving  our  attention  directly 
to  this  word,  it  will  be  well  to  consider  what  might 
be  said  in  favor  of  one  which  has  somewhat  similar 
claims  to  a  place  in  the  language  —  undisfellow ship- 
able.  We  have  seen  that  the  verb  to  fellowship  has 
the  "  authority  "  of  ancient  and  distinguished  usage. 
Now,  if  we  can  fellowship  with  a  man,  we  may  disfel- 
lowship  with  him  ;  and  if  a  man  whom  we  may  rely 
upon  is  a  reliable  man,  a  man  whom  we  can  disfellow- 
ship  with  is  disfellowshipable,  and  one  whose  claims 
upon  us  are  such  that  we  cannot  disfellowship  with 
him  is  undisfellowshipable.  I  admit  that  I  can  dis- 
cover no  defect  in  this  reasoning  if  the  premises  are 
granted.  If  mere  ancient  and  honorable  use  author- 
izes a  word,  the  verb  to  fellowship  —  as,  I  would 
fellowship  with  him  —  has  undeniable  authority  ;  and 
no  reason  which  can  be  given  for  calling  a  man  who 
may  be  relied  upon  reliable  will  fail  to  support  us  in 
calling  a  man  who  can  be  fellowshipped  with  fellow- 
shipable.  It  may,  however,  be  urged,  —  and  I  should 
venture  to  take  the  position,  —  that  the  mere  use  of 
a  word,  or  a  collocation  of  syllables  with  an  implied 
meaning,  whatever  the  eminence  of  the  user,  is  not  a 
sufficient  ground  for  the  reception  of  that  word  into 
the  recognized  vocabulary  of  a  language.  For  in- 
stance, the  word  vntrinsecate  is  used  by  Shakespeare 
himself :  — 

"  Come,  mortal  wretch, 
With  thy  sharp  tooth  this  knot  intrinsecate 
Of  life  at  once  untie." 

Anton]/  and  Cleopatra,  V.  2. 


WORDS  THAT  ARE  NOT  WORDS     203 

This  may  have  been  a  superfluous  attemi^t  to  Angli- 
cize the  Italian  intrinsecare,  or,  as  Dr.  Johnson  sug- 
gested, an  ignorant  formation  between  intricate  and 
intrinsical.  But  notwithstanding  the  eminence  of  the 
user,  it  has  no  recognized  place  in  the  language,  and 
is  one  of  the  words  that  arc  not  words. 

lieJiablc  is  conspicuous  among  those  words.  That 
it  is  often  heard  merely  shows  that  many  persons 
have  been  led  into  the  error  of  using  it ;  that  other 
words  of  like  formation  have  been  found  in  the  writ- 
ings of  men  of  more  or  less  note  in  literature  merely 
shows  that  inferior  men  are  not  more  incapable  than 
Shakespeare  was  of  using  words  ignorantly  formed  by 
the  union  of  incongruous  elements.  Passing  for  the 
present  the  words  which  are  brought  up  to  support 
reliable  by  analogy  (on  the  ground,  it  woidd  seem, 
unless  they  themselves  can  be  sustained  by  reason, 
that  one  error  may  be  justified  by  others),  let  us  con- 
fine our  attention  to  that  one  of  the  group  which, 
being  ofteuest  heard,  is  of  most  importance. 

Probably  no  accumulation  of  reason  and  authority 
would  protect  the  language  from  this  innovating  word 
(which  is  none  the  worse,  however,  because  it  is  new)  ; 
for  to  some  sins  men  are  so  wedded  that  they  will  shut 
their  ears  to  Moses  and  the  prophets,  and  to  one  risen 
from  the  dead.  Previous  writers  have  well  remarked 
that  it  is  anomalous  in  position  and  incongruous  in 
formation  ;  that  adjectives  in  ahle,  or  its  equivalent, 
ihle,  are  formed  from  verbs  transitive,  the  passive 
participle  of  which  can  be  united  with  the  meaning 
of  the  suffix  in  the  definition  of  the  adjective.  For 
example,  lovable^  that  may  be  loved ;  legible,  that 
may  be  read ;  eatahle,  that  may  be  eaten  ;  curable^ 
that  may  be  cured,  and  so  forth  \  that  reliable  does 


204  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

not  mean  that  may  be  relied,  but  is  used  to  mean  that 
may  be  relied  upon,  and  that,  therefore,  it  is  not 
tolerable.  The  counter-plea  has  been,  until  recently, 
usage  and  convenience.  But  the  usage  in  question 
has  been  too  short  and  too  unauthoritative  to  have 
any  weight ;  and  convenience  is  not  a  justification  of 
monstrosity,  when  the  monstrosity  is  great,  offensive, 
and  of  degrading  influence,  and  the  convenience  so 
small  as  to  be  inappreciable.  But  it  has  been  re- 
cently urged,  with  an  air  of  pardonable  triumph,  that 
the  rule  of  formation  above  mentioned  has  not  pre- 
vailed in  our  language,  as  is  shown  by  the  presence  in 
it  of  long-established  adjectives,  bearing  with  them  the 
weight  of  all  possible  authority ;  for  instance,  laugh- 
able^ which  does  not  mean  that  may  be  laughed,  but 
that  may  be  laughed  at.  Here  the  case  has  rested ; 
and  if  this  argument  could  not  be  overthrown,  the 
question  would  have  been  decided  by  it,  and  the  use 
of  reliable  would  be  a  matter  of  individual  taste.  But 
the  argument  goes  too  far,  because  those  who  used  it 
did  not  go  far  enough.  Comfortable  does  not  mean 
that  may  be  comforted,  but  that  has  or  that  gives  com- 
fort ;  forcible,  not  that  may  be  forced,  but  that  is  able 
to  force;  seasonable,  x\oti\\2it  may  be  seasoned,  but 
that  is  in  season,  in  accord  with  the  season ;  leisur- 
ahle,  that  has  leisure  ;  fashionable,  that  has  fashion. 
The  suffix  able,  in  Latin  abilis,  expresses  the  idea  of 
power,^  and  so  of  capacity,  ability,  fitness.  It  may 
be  affixed  either  to  verbs  or  to  nouns ;  and  of  adjec- 
tives in  this  class  not  a  few  are  formed  upon  the  latter. 
In  the  examples  above  it  is  affixed  to  nouns.  Now, 
laugh  is  a  noun,  and  laughable,  marriageable,  trea- 
sonable, leisurable,  objectionable,  and  companionable 

^  See  Tooke's  Diversions  of  Purley,  vol.  ii.  p.  502. 


WORDS  THAT  ARE  NOT  WORDS      205 

are  in  the  same  category.  Laughahle  does,  in  efiPect, 
mean  that  may  be  hiughed  at,  as  ohjectionahle  means, 
in  effect,  that  may  be  objected  to  ;  but  neither  must, 
therefore,  be  regarded  as  formed  from  the  verb  by 
which  each  may  be  defined.  Finally,  the  fact  is  that, 
excepting  a  comparatively  few  adjectives  in  able  or 
ihle  thus  formed  upon  nouns,^  every  one  of  the  multi- 
tudinous class  of  adjectives  formed  by  this  suffix  —  a 
class  which  includes  about  nine  hundred  words  —  is 
formed  upon  a  verb  transitive,  and  may  be  defined 
by  the  passive  participle.  They  afford,  therefore,  no 
support  to  the  word  reliable,  because  we  cannot  rely 
an}i;hing. 

Professor  Whitney,  in  his  book  on  "  The  Study  of 
Language,"  a  work  combining  knowledge  and  wis- 
dom in  a  greater  degree  than  any  other  of  its  kind  in 
English  literature,  gives  some  attention  to  the  word 
in  question,  but  contents  himself  with  setting  forth 
the  arguments  for  and  against  it,  without  summing  up 
the  case  and  passing  judgment.  Among  the  reasons 
in  its  favor  he  mentions  "  the  enrichment  of  the  lan- 
guage by  a  synonym,  which  may  yet  be  made  to  dis- 
tinguish a  valuable  shade  of  meaning ;  which,  indeed, 
already  shows  sight  of  doing  so,  as  we  tend  to  say  '  a 
trustui07-tJi7/  witness  '  but  '■reliable  testimony.'  " 

This  is  plausible,  but  only  plausible  ;  and  it  has 
been  well  answered  by  an  able  pupil  of  Professor 
Whitney's,  and  one  worthy  of  his  master,^  as  follows  t 

"  A  little  examination  will  show  that  there  is  no  case  at  all  for 
the  word  in  question.     There  is  really  no  tendency  whatever, 

1  No  small  proportion  of  them  is  cited  ahove.  Many  which 
fiave  no  proper  place  in  the  language  arc  to  be  found  in  diction- 
aries. 

2  Mr.  Charlton  Lewis  in  The  Evening  Post  of  March  C,  18G9. 


206  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

in  common  speech,  to  differentiate  the  two  words  in  the  senses 
named,  for  reliable  is,  in  a  hirge  majority  of  cases,  applied  to 
persons.  Nor,  if  there  were  such  a  tendency,  would  it  add  any- 
thing to  the  language,  any  more  than  to  devise  two  distinct  verbs 
meaning  believe,  the  one  to  express  believing  a  man,  the  other, 
believing  what  he  says." 

Of  the  common  use  of  reliable,  I  met  with  the  fol- 
lowing amusing  and  illustrative  example  in  the  Paris 
correspondence  of  the  London  "  Star."  The  Prince 
and  Princess  Christian,  arriving  at  the  French  cajsital, 
had  been  compelled,  for  want  of  better  carriage,  to 
visit  Trianon  in  a  cab.  Whereupon  a  quarter  of  a 
column  of  British  astonishment  and  disgust,  closing 
with  this  paragraph :  — 

"  I  do  the  justice  to  the  Prefect  to  assert  that  a  telegram 
despatched  on  the  party  leaving  Paris  would  have  secured  the 
presence  of  a  more  reliable  vehicle  than  a  hackney  cab  at  the 
Versailles  station." 

Here  our  word  is  put  to  fitting  service  in  contrasting 
a  reliable  vehicle  with  an  unreliable  cab.  And  here 
is  yet  another  instance  in  which  the  word  appears 
suitably  accompanied.  The  sentence  is  from  the  pro- 
spectus of  "  The  Democrat,"  published  by  the  gentle- 
man known  as  "  Brick  Pomeroy." 

"  Politically  it  will  be  Democratic,  red-hot  and  reliable." 

The  red-hot  and  reliable  democracy  of  Mr.  "  Brick 
Pomeroy's "  paper  and  the  unreliable  cab  at  Ver- 
sailles are  well  consorted. 

Of  the  few  words  which  may  be,  and  some  of  which 
have  been,  cited  in  support  of  reliable,  here  follow 
the  most  important  —  the  examples  of  their  use  being 
taken  from  Richardson's  Dictionary  :  — 

Anchorable.  "  The  sea,  everywhere  twenty  leagues  from  land, 
is  anchorable."  —  Sir  T.  Herbert. 


WORDS  THAT  ARE  NOT  WORDS      207 

Complainahle.  "  Though  both  be  blamable,  yet  superstition  is 
less  complainahle."  —  Feltham. 

Disposable.  "  The  office  is  not  disposahle  by  the  crown."  — 
Burke. 

Inquirahle.  "  There  may  be  many  more  things  inquirahle  by 
you."  —  Bacon. 

Of  these  passages,  the  first  affords  an  example  of 
the  improper  use  of  words  properly  formed ;  the 
second,  of  unjustifiable  formations,  like  reliable.  A 
vessel  may  be  anchorable  ;  a  sea  cannot  be  so :  neither 
a  superstition  nor  anything  else  can  be  complainahle, 
although  it  may  be  complained  of.  Herbert  and  Felt- 
ham  could  go  astray  in  the  use  of  anchorahle  and 
comjilciinuble^  as  Shakespeare  could  in  that  of  intrin- 
secate.  The  other  two  words  could  be  accepted  as  of 
any  weight  upon  this  question  only  through  ignorance 
both  of  their  meaning  and  their  history.  Disjwse  does 
not  need  of'  to  complete  its  transitive  sense  ;  and  the 
preposition  has  been  added  to  it  in  common  usage 
quite  recently  —  long  after  disposahle  came  into  the 
language.  Richardson  affords  the  following  examples 
in  point :  — 

"  Sens  God  seeth  everything  out  of  doutance, 
And  hem  disposeth  through  his  ordinance." 

Chaucer. 

"  But  God,  who  secretly  disposeth  the  course  of  things." 

Tyndal. 

And  to  this  day  we  say  that  people  dispose  (not 
dispose  of)  themselves  in  groups  to  their  liking,  as 
Spenser  said  :  — 

"  The  rest  themselves  in  troupes  did  else  dispose." 

Faerie  Queene,  II.  8. 

And  accordingly  Prynne,  a  carefid  writer,  wlio 
lived  two  hundred  years  before  Burke,  says  of  the 
realm  of  Bohemia,  "  most  of  the  great  offices  of  which 


208  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

realme    are    hereditary,    and    not    disposable   by   the 
king." 

Inquirahle^  as  used  by  Bacon,  means,  not  that  may 
be  inquired  into,  but  that  may  be  inquired,  i.  e., 
asked.  It  is  simply  equivalent  to  askable.  In  the 
sense  of  inquired  into  it  would  not  be  admissible,  and 
no  recent  examples  of  its  use,  or  of  its  use  in  that 
sense,  are  cited  by  Richardson. 

Available  —  the  word  which  seems  most  to  support 
reliable^  because  it  is  surely  formed  upon  the  verb 
avail,  and  because,  although  we  may  say  of  a  thing 
that  it  avails  much  or  it  avails  nought,  we  cannot  say 
it  may  be  availed  —  is  itself  unavailable  to  the  end 
for  which  it  is  cited.  For  avail  itself  is  an  anoma- 
lous and  exceptional  word  in  the  manner  of  its  use. 
It  means  to  have  value,  eifect,  worth,  power.  Yet  we 
say,  both,  It  avails  little,  and  He  avails  hunself  of  it ; 
both,  Of  what  avail  was  it  ?  and  It  was  of  no  avail, 
as  we  say.  Of  what  worth  was  it  ?  and  It  was  of  no 
worth.  But  we  cannot,  or  do  not,  speak  of  the  avail 
of  anything,  as  we  speak  of  the  worth  of  anything. 
Avail,  both  as  verb  and  substantive,  was  used  abso- 
lutely by  our  early  writers  in  the  sense  of  value,  and 
available  —  i.  e.,  that  may  be  valued  —  came  into  the 
lana-uasre  under  those  circumstances. 

Unrepentable,  which  is  used  by  PoUok,  a  writer  of 
low  rank  and  no  authority,  has  been  cited  in  support 
of  reliable.  But  there  is  no  verb  luirepent ;  nor  is 
there  any  instance  known  of  the  use  of  the  adjective 
repentable.  And  although  examples  are  numerous  of 
the  use  in  the  Elizabethan  period  of  repent  absolutely, 
without  o/",^  yet  we  read  in  our  English  Bible  not  of  a 
repentance  not  repentable,  but  of  "  a  repentance  not 
to  be  repented  of." 

*  See  Mrs.  Clarke's  Concordance  to  Shakespeare. 


WORDS  THAT   AKE   NOT  WORDS  209 

Accountable  and  cmstocrable  are,  like  available^ 
anomalous,  self-incongruous,  and  exceptionable.  Ac- 
countable is  used  to  mean,  not  that  may  be  accounted 
for,  but  that  may  be  held  to  account ;  but  ansiverahle 
is  used  to  mean  both  that  may  be  answered  (in 
Avhich  it  is  not  a  counterpart  of  reliable^  and,  that 
may  be  held  to  answer  ;  while  unaccountable  is  used 
only  to  mean  that  cannot  be  accounted  for,  and  unan- 
swerable^ only  that  cannot  be  answered.  These  adjec- 
tives are  out  of  all  keeping. 

These  are  all  the  instances  of  adjectives  in  ble 
which  are  worthy  of  attention  in  the  consideration  of 
this  formation  ;  and  we  have  seen  that  none  of  them 
support  the  use  of  the  affix  with  a  verb  dependent 
and  intransitive,  like  rely.  If  there  were  a  noun  rely^ 
upon  that  we  might  form  reliable.,  as  companionable 
has  been  formed  on  companion,  and  dutiable  on  duty. 
Unless  we  keep  to  this  law  of  formation,  there  is  no 
knowing  where  we  may  find  ourselves,  stranded,  it 
may  be,  on  some  such  rock  as  a  grievable  tale,  an 
untrifleable  person,  or  a  weepa,ble  tragedy.  For  in- 
stance, reliable  has  been  followed  into  the  world  by  a 
worthy  kinsman,  liveable,  in  the  phrase  "  a  liveable 
house,"  which  we  not  only  hear  now  sometimes,  but 
even  see  in  print,  although  it  has  not  yet  been  taken 
into  the  dictionaries.  See,  for  example,  the  following 
passage  from  a  magazine  of  such  high  and  well-de- 
served a  reputation  as  "  Macmillan's  :  "  — 

"  In  the  first  place,  we  would  lay  clown  as  a  fundamental  prin- 
ciple in  furnishing,  that  the  end  in  view  should  he  to  make  a 
house  or  a  room  cheerful,  comfortable,  and  liveable.  We  say 
Mveable,  because  there  are  so  many  which,  though  handsomely 
furnished,  are  dreary  in  the  extreme,  and  the  very  thought  of 
living  in  them  makes  one  shudder." 


210  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

Now,  a  life  is  liveable,  because  a  man  may  live  a 
life,  as  he  can  be  himself  ;  but  a  house  cannot  be  lived 
any  more  than  a  pea-jacket.  Either  may  be  lived  in, 
according  to  the  liver's  fancy.  Let  us  not,  through 
mere  sloth  and  slovenliness,  give  up  for  such  a  mess 
as  reliable  our  birthright  in  a  good  word  and  a  good 
phrase  for  a  man  who  is  trustworthy,  and  whose  word 
may  be  relied  upon. 

Preventative,  Casuality,  receive  a  passing  no- 
tice, only  because  they  are  heard  so  often  instead  of 
preventive,  casualty.  They  ought  to  be,  but  I  fear 
that  they  are  not,  evidences  of  an  utter  want  of  edu- 
cation and  of  a  low  grade  of  intelligence. 

Resurrected.  —  This  amazing  formation  has  lately 
appeared  in  some  of  our  newspapers,  one  of  them 
edited  by  a  man  who  has  been  clerk  of  the  Senate, 
another  one  of  the  most  carefully  edited  journals  in 
the  country.     For  example  :  — 

"  The  invention  described  in  yesterday's  '  Times,'  and  displayed 
on  Saturday  at  Newark,  by  which  a  person  who  may  happen  to 
be  buried  alive  is  enabled  to  resurrect  himself  from  the  grave, 
may  leave  some  people  to  fancy  there  is  actual  danger  of  their 
being  buried  alive." 

A  weekly  paper,  of  some  pretensions,  now  extinct, 
described  Thomas  Rowley  as  a  priest  whose  writings 
Chatterton  "  professed  to  resurrect  in  the  form  of  old, 
stained,  moth-eaten  manuscripts." 

What  is  this  word  intended  to  mean  ?  Possibly  the 
same  act  which  people  who  speak  English  mean  when 
they  say  that  Lazarus  was  raised  from  the  dead.  The 
formation  of  resurrect  from  resurrection  is  just  of  a 
piece  with  the  formation  of  donate  from  donation, 
intei'cess  from  intercession.  But  it  is  somewhat  worse ; 
for  resurrected  is  used  to  mean  raised,  and  resurreo 


WORDS   THAT   ARE   NOT   WORDS  211 

tion  does  not  mean  raising,  but  rising*.  Thus  we 
speak  of  the  raising  of  Lazarus,  but  of  the  resurrection 
of  Christ ;  of  God's  raising  the  dead,  but  of  the  resur- 
rection  of  the  dead. 

Sis,  Sissy.  —  The  gentlemen  who,  with  affectionate 
gayety  and  gay  affection,  address  very  young  hulies 
as  Sis  or  Sissy,  indulge  themselves  in  that  captivating 
freedom  in  the  belief  that  they  are  merely  using  an 
abbreviation  of  sister.  They  are  wrong.  They  doubt- 
less mean  to  be  fraternal,  or  paternal,  and  so  subjec- 
tively their  notion  is  correct.  But  Sis,  as  a  generic 
name  for  a  young  girl,  has  come  straight  down  to  us, 
without  the  break  of  a  day,  from  the  dark  ages.  It 
is  a  mere  abbreviation  or  nickname  of  Cicely,  and 
appears  all  through  our  early  literature  as  Cis  and 
Cissy.  It  was  used,  like  Jocm  and  Moll,  to  mean 
any  young  girl,  as  Mob  or  JFTob,  the  nicknames  of 
Robert,  were  applied  in  a  general  way  to  any  young 
man  of  the  lower  classes. 

"  Robert 's  esteemed  for  handling'  flail, 
And  Ciss  for  her  clean  railking-pail." 

The  Sarah-ad,  1742,  p.  5. 

Shamefaced,  as  every  reader  of  Archbishop 
Trench's  books  on  English  knows,  is  a  mere  corrup- 
tion of  shamefast,  a  word  of  the  steadfast  sort.  The 
corruption,  doubtless,  had  its  origin  in  a  misapprehen- 
sion due  to  the  fact  that  fast  was  pronounced  like 
facd,  with  the  name  sound  of  a,  which  led  to  the  sup- 
position that  shamefast  was  merely  an  irregular  spell- 
ing of  shamefaced.  To  a  similar  confusion  of  words 
pronounced  alike  we  owe  the  phrase  "  not  worth  a 
damn,"  in  which  the  last  word  rej^resents  water-cress. 
The  Anglo-Saxon  name  of  the  cress  was  cerse  ;  and 
this,  by  that  transposition  of  the  r  so  common  in  the 


212  WORDS  AND   THEIR   USES 

earlier  stages  of  our  language,  and  wliieli  gave  us  bird 
for  hrid,  and  hum  for  hren,  became  crcs.  But  for  a 
long  time  it  retained  its  original  form ;  and  a  man  who 
meant  to  say  that  anything  was  of  very  little  value, 
said  sometimes  that  it  was  not  worth  a  rush,  and 
others  that  it  was  not  worth  a  cerse,  or  kerse.  For 
example  (one  of  many),  see  this  passage  of  "  Piers 
Ploughman's  Vision  :  " — 

"  Wisdom  and  wit  now 
Is  noght  worth  a  kerse, 
But  if  it  be  carded  with  coveitise, 
As  clotheres  kemben  his  wolle." 

Identity  of  sound  between  two  words  led  to  a  mis- 
apprehension which  changed  the  old  phrase  into  "  not 
worth  a  curse ; "  and  a  liking  for  variety,  which  has 
not  been  without  its  influence,  even  in  the  vocabulary 
of  oaths  and  objurgations,  led  to  the  substitution  to 
which  we  owe  "  not  worth  a  damn."  But  for  one 
variety  of  this  phrase,  which  is  peculiar  to  this  coun- 
try, and  which  is  one  of  its  very  few  original  peculiar- 
ities, "  not  worth  a  continental  damn,"  I  am  at  a  loss 
to  assign  a  source ;  except  that  it  may  be  found  in 
that  tendency  to  vastness  of  ideas,  and  that  love  of 
annexation  of  which  we  are  somewhat  justly  accused, 
and  which  crops  out  even  in  our  swearing. 

Stand-point.  —  To  say  the  best  of  it,  this  is  a  poor 
compound.  It  receives  some  support,  but  not  full 
justification,  from  the  German  stand-^ninht,  of  which, 
indeed,  it  is  supposed  to  be  an  Anglicized  form,  first 
used  by  Professor  Moses  Taylor.  Granting  for  the 
moment  that  st(md-poi7it  maybe  accepted  as  meaning 
standing-point,  and  that  when  we  say,  from  our  stand- 
point, we  intend  to  say  from  the  point  at  which  we 
stand,  what  we  really  mean  is,  from  onr  point  of  view, 


WORDS  THAT  ARE  NOT  WORDS      213 

and  we  should  say  so.  Periphrasis  is  to  be  avoided 
when  it  is  complicated  or  burdensome,  but  never  at 
the  cost  of  correctness  ;  and  periphrasis  is  sometimes 
not  only  stronger,  because  clearer,  than  a  single  word, 
but  more  elegant.  Stimd-point,  whatever  the  channel 
of  its  coming-  into  use,  is  of  the  sort  to  which  the  vul- 
gar words  ivash-tub,  shoe-horii,  hreic-house,  cook-stove, 
and  go-cart  belong,  the  first  four  of  which  are  merely 
slovenly  and  uncouth  abbreviations  of  vxisJung-tiih, 
shoeiny-horn,  brewmg -house,  and  cooking-stove,  the 
last  being  a  nursery  word,  a  counterpart  to  which 
would  be  rock-Jiorse,  instead  of  rocking-horse.  Com- 
pounds of  this  kind  are  properly  formed  by  the  union 
of  a  substantive  or  participle,  used  adjectively,  with  a 
substantive  ;  and  their  meaning  may  be  exactly  ex- 
pressed by  reversing  the  position  of  the  elements  of 
the  compound,  and  connecting  them  by  one  of  the 
prepositions  of,  to,  and  for.  Thus,  death-hed,  bed  of 
death  ;  stumbling-block,  block  of  stumbling ;  turning 
point,  point  of  turning ;  play-ground,  ground  for  play ; 
deiv-point,  point  of  dew ;  steam-boat,  boat  for  or  of 
steam  (bateau  de  vapeiLr^  ;  starvation-point,  point  of 
starvation ;  horse-trough,  trough  for  horses ;  rain-bow, 
bow  of  rain  ;  bread-knife,  knife  for  bread  ;  house-to]}, 
top  of  house ;  dancing-girl,  girl  for  dancing ;  and 
standing-point,  point  for  or  of  standing ;  and  so  forth. 
But  by  no  contrivance  can  we  explain  stand-2^oint  as 
the  point  of,  or  to,  or  for,  stand. 

Telegram.  —  This  word,  which  is  claimed  as  an 
"  American  "  production,  has  taken  root  quickly,  and 
is  probably  well  fixed  in  the  language.  It  is  both 
superfluous  and  incorrectly  formed  ;  but  it  is  regarded 
us  convenient,  and  has  been  allowed  to  pass  muster. 
Telegraph  is  equally  good  as  a  verb  expressing  the 


21i  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

act  of  writing,  and  as  a  noun  expressing  the  thing 
written.  This  is  according  to  a  well-known  analogy 
of  the  language.  But  they  who  must  have  a  distinct 
etymology  for  every  word  may  regard  telegraph.,  the 
verb,  as  from  ypa^etv  (^grapheiTi)  =  to  write,  and  the 
noun  as  from  the  Greek  noun  ypa(^r]  (jjrajihe)  =2^ 
writing.  In  mo7iograph,  epigraph.,  and  paragraph., 
the  last  syllable  in  like  manner  represents  ypa^?; 
(^graphe)  ;  in  'monogram,  epigram,  and  diagram  the 
last  syllable  represents  ypafxfxa  (^gramma^  =  an  engraved 
character,  a  letter.^  This  distinction,  remembered, 
will  prevent  a  confusion  which  prevails  with  many 
speakers  as  to  certain  words  in  graph  and  gram,.  A 
monograph  is  an  essay  or  an  account  having  a  single 
subject ;  a  monogram,  a  character  or  cipher  composed 
of  several  letters  combined  in  one  figure  :  an  epigraph 
is  an  inscription,  a  citation,  a  motto ;  an  epigram,  a 
short  poem  on  one  subject.  The  confusion  of  these 
terminations  has  recently  led  some  writers  into  errors 
which  are  amazing  and  amusing.  We  have  had  pho- 
togram  proposed,  and  stereogram,  and  —  Cadmus 
save  us !  —  cablegram  not  only  proposed,  but  used. 
Finally,  to  cap  the  climax  of  absui'dity,  some  ingenious 
person,  encouraged  by  such  example,  proposes  thala- 
gram  as  "  fully  expressive  and  every  way  appropri- 
ate," because  thalassa  is  the  Greek  for  sea,  and 
gramma  the  Greek  for  letter,  and  the  letters  come 
through  the  sea.     The  first  two,  although  homogene- 

1  rpafi/ua,  libera,  scriptura  ;  (2)  librum  ;  (3)  scriptum  quod- 
cunque  ut  tabulse  publicse  leges,  libri  rationum,  etc.,  et  in  plurali ; 
(4)  epistola,  literje;  (5)  literse,  doctrina;  (6)  acta  publica,  tabu- 
Ife;  (7)  chirographum. 

rpa4)7j,  scriptura,  scriptlo;  (2)  pictura;  (3)  accusatio.  —  Hede* 
rid  Lexicon. 


WORDS  THAT  ARE  NOT  WORDS     215 

ous,  are  incorrect,  the  proper  termination  in  both 
cases  being  graphs  representing  ypa^iy  (jgrapTie)^  a 
wi'iting,  and  not  gram,  from  ypaixfxa  (^gramma),  a 
character ;  and  in  the  third  there  is  not  only  the  same 
error,  but  the  incongruous  union  of  the  Teutonic  cable 
with  the  Greek  gramma.  The  last  is  not  worth  seri- 
ous consideration.  Such  words  as  cahlegram  and 
thalagram  are  only  deplorable  and  ridiculous  examples 
of  what  is  produced  when  men  who  are  unfit  to  work 
in  language  undertake  to  make  a  word  that  is  not 
wanted.  There  is  no  more  need  of  such  words  as 
cablegram,  and  thalagram  were  meant  to  be,  than 
there  is  of  a  new  name  for  bread-and-butter.  A  tele- 
graph is  the  thing  which  sends  words  from  afar,  and 
telegram  is  in  general  use  to  mean  the  word  or  words 
so  sent ;  and  whether  they  come  across  land  or  water, 
what  matter  ?  what  is  it  to  any  reasonable  purpose  ? 
A  telegram  from  Europe,  or  from  California,  or  from 
China,  is  all  the  same,  whatever  may  be  the  route  by 
which  it  is  sent.  Whether  it  comes  by  an  iron  cable, 
or  a  copper  wire,  over  land  or  through  water,  what 
difference?  There  could  not  be  a  liner  specimen  of 
an  utterly  superfluous  monster  than  this  English- 
Greek  hybrid  cablegram. 

Time  and  Tide  wait  for  no  Man.  —  This  pro- 
verb, one  of  the  oldest  in  the  language,  one  of  the  most 
commonly  used,  and  one  which  cannot  be  expressed 
with  its  full  force  and  point  in  any  other  tongue,  may 
be  noticed  here  without  impropriety,  because  it  is 
probably  not  understood  by  one  in  a  thousand  of  its 
users.  The  word  misunderstood  is  tide,  which,  con- 
trary to  almost  universal  apprehension  of  the  adage, 
does  not  here  mean  the  ebb  and  flow  of  the  ocean. 
Tide  has  here  its  original  meaning  —  time.     Thus  we 


216  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

fiud  in  some  Middle  English  Glosses,  published  in  the 
"Reliquiae  Antiquae"  (vol.  i.  p.  12),  '■'' tempore=- 
tyda."  But  tide  is  not  a  mere  synonym  of  time  ;  it 
means  a  time,  an  allotment  of  time,  an  occasion.  It 
was  long  used  for  liour^  as  in  the  following  Anglo- 
Saxon  statement  of  the  length  of  the  year:  "dis  is 
full  yer,  twelf  monpas  fulle  and  endlufan  dagas,  six 
tida;"  i.  e.,  this  is  a  full  year,  twelve  full  months, 
and  eleven  days,  six  hours.  It  meant  also  a  certain 
or  an  appointed  time ;  e.  //.,  "  Nu  tumorgen  on  pis 
ylcan  tid,"  i.  e..  Now  to-morrow  on  this  same  time. 
(Exodus  ix.  18.)  This  sense  of  an  appointed  time  it 
had  in  the  old,  and  now  no  longer  heard,  saying.  The 
tider  you  go,  the  tider  you  come,  which  Skinner  ren- 
ders thus  in  Latin  :  Quo  temjjorius  discedis,  eo  tem- 
jiorius  recedis.  The  ebb  and  flow  of  the  sea  came  to 
be  called  the  tide  because  it  takes  place  at  appointed 
seasons.  The  use  of  tide  in  this  sense,  a  set  time,  a 
season,  continued  to  a  very  late  period ;  of  which  the 
following  passage  from  Shakespeare  is  an  example : 

"  What  hath  this  day  deserved, 
That  it  in  golden  letters  should  be  set 
Among  the  high  tides  in  the  calendar  ?  " 

King  John,  iii.  1. 

where  "  high  tides  "  has  plainly  no  meaning  of  peculiar 
interest  to  mariners  and  fishermen.  Chaucer  says,  in 
"  Troilus  and  Cressida :  "  — 

"  The  morrow  came,  and  nighen  gan  the  time 
Of  mealtide." 

This  use  of  the  word  is  still  preserved  in  the  names  of 
two  appointed  seasons,  the  church  festivals  Whitsun- 
tide and  Christmastide,  or  Christtide,  which  are  more 
in  vogue  in  England  than  in  this  country.  Tide 
appears  in  this  sense  in  the  word  betide.     For  exam- 


WORDS  THAT  ARE  KOT  WORDS     217 

pie  :  Woe  betide  you !  that  is,  Woe  await  you ;  May 

there  be  occasion  of  woe  to  you.      Tide  was  thus  used 

before  the  addition  of  the  prefix  he,  as  in  the  following 

lines  from  a  poetical  interpretation  of  dreams,  written 

about  A.  D.  1315  :  — 

"  Gif  the  see  is  yn  tempeste 
The  tid  anguisse  ant  eke  cheste  "  (i.  e.,  strife). 

Our  proverb,  therefore,  means,  not  time  and  the 
flow  of  the  sea  wait  for  no  man,  but  time  and  occasion, 
opportunity,  wait  for  no  man.  The  proverb  appears 
almost  literally  in  the  following  lines,  which  are  the 
first  two  of  an  epitaph  of  the  fifteenth  century,  that 
may  be  found  in  the  "  Reliquiae  Antiqua? "  (vol.  i.  p. 
268) :  — 

"  Farewell,  my  frendis,  the  tide  abideth  no  man ; 
I  am  departed  fro  this,  and  so  shall  ye," 

where,  again,  there  is  manifestly  no  allusion  to  the 
flow  of  water.  There  is  an  old  agricultural  phrase 
still  used  among  the  Lowland  Scotch  farmers,  in 
which  tide  appears  in  the  sense  of  season :  "  The 
grund  's  no  in  tid,"  i.  e..  The  ground  is  not  in  season, 
not  ready  at  the  proper  time  for  the  earing. 

The  use  of  tide  in  its  sense  of  hour,  the  hour,  led 
naturally  to  a  use  of  hour  for  tide.  Among  the 
examples  that  might  be  cited  of  this  conversion, 
there  is  a  passage  in  "  Macbeth  "  which  has  long 
been  a  puzzle  to  readers  and  commentators,  and  upon 
which,  in  my  own  edition  of  Shakespeare,  I  have 
given  only  some  not  very  relevant  comments  by  the 
Rev.  Mr.  Hunter.     Macbeth  says  (Act  i.  scene  3),  — 

"  Time  and  the  hour  runs  through  the  roughest  day." 

As  an  hour  is  but  a  measured  lapse  of  time,  there 
has   been    much   discussion    as   to  why  Shakespeare 


218  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

should  have  written  "  time  and  the  hour,"  and  many 
passages  have  been  quoted  from  Shakespeare  and 
other  poets  by  the  commentators,  in  which  time  and 
hour  are  found  in  close  relation ;  but  they  are  all,  as 
such  quotations  are  apt  to  be,  quite  from  the  purpose. 
"  Time  and  the  hour  "  in  this  passage  is  merely  an 
equivalent  of  time  and  tide  —  the  time  and  tide  that 
wait  for  no  man.  Macbeth's  brave  but  unsteadfast 
soul  is  shaken  to  its  loose  foundations  by  the  prophe- 
cies of  the  witches,  and  the  speedy  fulfilment  of  the 
first  of  them.  His  ambition  fires  like  tinder  at  the 
touch  of  temptation,  and  his  quick  imagination  sets 
before  him  the  bloody  path  by  which  he  is  to  reach 
the  last  and  highest  prize,  the  promised  throne.  But 
his  good  instincts  —  for  he  has  instincts,  not  purposes 
—  revolt  at  the  hideous  prospect,  and  his  whole  na- 
ture is  in  a  tumult  of  conflicting  emotion.  The  soul 
of  the  man  that  would  not  play  false,  and  yet  would 
wrongly  win,  is  laid  open  at  a  stroke  to  us  in  this 
first  sight  we  have  of  him.  After  shying  at  the  ugly 
thing,  from  which,  however,  he  does  not  bolt,  at  last 
he  says,  cheating  himself  with  the  thought  that  he 
will  wait  on  Providence,  — 

"  If  chance  -will  have  me  king,  why,  chance  may  crown  me 
Without  my  stir." 

And  then  he  helps  himself  out  of  his  tribulation,  as 
men  often  do,  with  an  old  saw,  and  says  it  will  all 
come  right  in  the  end.  Looking  into  the  black, 
turbulent  future,  which  would  be  all  bright  and  clear 
if  he  would  give  up  his  bad  ambition,  he  neither 
turns  back  nor  goes  forward,  but  says,  — 

"  Come  what  come  may, 
Time  and  the  hour  runs  through  the  roughest  day." 

That  is,  time  and  opportunity,   time  and  tide,   run 


WORDS  THAT  ARE  NOT  WORDS  219 

through  the  roughest  day ;  the  clay  most  thickly 
bestead  with  trouble  is  long  enough,  and  has  occa- 
sions enough  for  the  service  and  the  safety  of 
a  ready,  quick-witted  man.  But  for  the  rhythm, 
Shakespeare  would  probably  have  written.  Time  and 
tide  run  through  the  roughest  day  ;  but  as  the  adage 
in  that  form  was  not  well  suited  to  his  verse,  he  used 
the  equivalent  phrase,  time  and  the  hour  (not  time 
and  an  hour,  or  time  and  the  hours) ;  and  the  ap- 
pearance of  the  singular  verb  in  this  line,  I  am 
inclined  to  regard  as  due  to  the  poet's  own  pen,  not 
as  accidental. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

FORMATION    OF    PRONOUNS.  —  SOME.  —  ADJECTIVES 

IN     EN.   EITHER    AND     NEITHER.  SHALL     AND 

WILL 

FORMATION   OF   PRONOUNS 

Two  correspondents  have  laid  before  me  the  great 
need  —  which  they  have  discovered  —  of  a  new  pro- 
noun in  English,  and  both  have  suggested  the  same 
means  of  supplying  the  deficiency,  which  is,  in  the 
woi-ds  of  the  first,  "  the  use  of  en^  or  some  more  eu- 
phonious substitute,  as  a  personal  pi'onoun,  common 
gender."  "  A  deficiency  exists  there,"  he  glibly 
continues,  "  and  we  should  fill  it."  My  other  corre- 
spondent has  a  somewhat  juster  notion  of  the  magni- 
tude of  his  proposition,  or,  as  I  should  rather  say, 
of  its  enormity.  But  still  he  insists  that  a  new 
pronoun  is  "  universally  needed,"  and  as  an  example 
of  the  inconvenience  caused  by  the  want,  he  gives 
the  following  sentence  :  — 

"  If  a  person  wishes  to  sleep,  they  must  n't  eat  cheese  for 
supper." 

"Of  course,"  he  goes  on  to  say,  "that  is  incorrect; 
yet  almost  every  one  would  say  they.''''  That  I 
venture  to  doubt.  "  Few  would  say  in  common 
conversation,  '  If  a  person  wishes  to  sleep,  he  or  she 
must  n't  eat  cheese  for  supper.'  It  is  too  much  trou- 
ble.    We  must  have  a  word  to  take  the  place  of  he 


FORMATION  OF  PRONOUNS  221 

or  sAe,  his  or  hers,  him  or  her,  etc.  .  .  .  As  the 
French  make  the  little  word  en  answer  a  great  many 
purposes,  suppose  we  take  the  same  word,  give  it  an 
English  pronunciation  (or  any  other  word),  and  make 
it  answer  for  any  and  every  case  of  that  kind,  and 
thus  tend  to  simplify  the  language." 

To  all  this  there  are  two  sufficient  replies.  First, 
the  thing  can't  be  done ;  last,  it  is  not  at  all  neces- 
sary or  desirable  that  it  should  be  done.  And  to 
consider  the  last  point  first.  There  is  no  such 
dilemma  as  the  one  in  question.  A  speaker  of  com- 
mon sense  and  common  mastery  of  English  would 
say,  "  If  a  man  wishes  to  sleep,  he  must  not  eat 
cheese  at  supper,"  ^  where  man,  as  in  the  word  man- 
kind, is  used  in  a  general  sense  for  the  species.  Any 
objection  to  this  use  of  ?7ian,  and  of  the  relative 
pronoun,  is  for  the  consideration  of  the  next  Woman's 
Eights  Convention,  at  which  I  hope  it  may  be  dis- 
cussed with  all  the  gravity  beseeming  its  momentous 
significance.  But  as  a  slight  contribution  to  the 
amenities  of  the  occasion,  I  venture  to  suggest  that 
to  free  the  language  from  the  oppression  of  the  sex 
and  from  the  outrage  to  its  dignity,  which  have  for 
centuries  lurked  in  this  use  of  m,an  and  he,  it  is  not 
necessary  to  say,  "If  a  person  wishes  to  sleep,  en 
must  n't  eat  cheese  for  supper,"  but  merely,  as  the 
speakers  of  the  best  English  now  say,  and  have  said 
for  generations,  "  If  one  wishes  to  sleep,  one  must  n't, 
etc."  One,  thus  used,  is  a  good  pronoun,  of  healthy, 
well-rooted  growth.  And  we  have  in  some  another 
word  which  supi)lles  all  our  need  in  this  respect  with- 
out our  going  to  the  French    for  their  over-worked 

^  Unless  we  mean  that  the  supper  consisted  entirely  or  chiefly  of 
cheese,  we  should  not  say  cheese  /or  supper,  but  cheese  at  supper. 


222  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

en  ;  e.  g.,  Voici  des  bonnes  /raises.  Voulez-vous  en 
avoir  f  These  are  fine  strawberries.  Will  you  have 
some  ?  Thus  used,  some  is  to  all  intents  and  purposes 
a  pronoun  which  leaves  nothing  to  be  desired.  With 
he,  she,  it,  and  we,  and  one,  and  some,  we  have  no 
need  of  en,  or  any  other  outlandish  pronoun.  Or  we 
should  have  had  one  long  ere  this.  For  the  service 
to  which  the  proposed  pronoun  would  be  put,  if  it 
were  adopted,  is  not  new.  The  need  is  one  which, 
if  it  exists  at  all,  must  have  been  felt  five  hundred 
years  ago  as  much  as  it  can  be  now.  At  that  period, 
and  long  before,  a  noun  in  the  third  person  singular 
was  represented,  according  to  its  gender,  by  the  pro- 
nouns he,  she,  or  it,  and  there  was  no  pronoun  of  com- 
mon gender  to  take  place  of  all  of  them.  In  the 
matter  of  language,  popular  need  is  inexorable,  and 
popular  ingenuity  inexhaustible ;  and  it  is  not  in  the 
nature  of  things  that,  if  the  imagined  need  had  existed, 
it  should  not  have  been  supplied  during  the  formative 
stages  of  our  language,  particularly  at  the  Elizabethan 
period,  to  which  we  owe  the  pronoun  its.  The  intro- 
duction of  this  word,  although  it  is  merely  a  possessive 
form  of  it,  was  a  work  of  so  much  time  and  difficulty, 
that  an  acquaintance  with  the  struggle  would  alone 
deter  a  considerate  man  from  attempting  to  make  a 
new  pronoun.  Although,  as  I  have  said,  it  is  a  mere 
possessive  form  of  a  word  which  had  been  on  the  lips 
of  all  men  of  Anglo-Saxon  blood  for  a  thousand  years, 
and  although  it  was  introduced  at  a  period'  notable  for 
bold  linguistic  innovations,  and  was  soon  adopted  by 
some  of  the  most  popular  writers,  Shakespeare  among 
them,  nearly  a  century  elapsed  before  it  was  firmly 
established  in  the  English  tongue. 

For  pronouns  are  of  all  words  the  remotest  of  origin, 


FORMATION   OF   PRONOUNS  223 

the  slowest  of  growth,  the  most  irregular  and  capri- 
cious in  their  manner  of  growth,  the  most  tenacious 
of  hold,  the  most  difficult  to  plant,  the  most  nearly 
impossible  to  transplant.  To  say  that  /,  the  first  of 
pronouns,  is  three  thousand  years  old,  is  quite  within 
bounds.  We  trace  it  through  the  Old  English  ich 
to  the  Anglo-Saxon  «c,  and  the  Gothic  ik.  It  appears 
in  the  Icelandic  e/;,  the  Danish  jeg,  the  Old  German 
iJi,  the  Russian  ^a,  the  Latin  and  Greek  ego,  and  the 
Sanscrit  aliam.  Should  any  of  my  readers  fail  to  see 
the  connection  between  ali-am  and  /,  let  him  consider 
for  a  moment  that  the  sound  expressed  by  the  English 
/is  ah-ee. 

The  antiquity  of  pronouns  is  shown,  also,  by  the 
irregularity  of  their  cases.  That  is  generally  a  trait 
of  the  oldest  words  in  any  language,  verbs  and  adjec- 
tives as  well  as  pronouns.  For  instance,  the  words  ex- 
pressing consciousness,  existence,  pleasure,  and  pain, 
the  first  and  commonest  linguistic  needs  of  all  peoples, 
—  in  English,  7,  he,  good,  had ;  in  Latin,  ego,  esse, 
bonus,  malus,  —  are  regular  in  no  language  that  I  can 
remember  within  the  narrow  circle  with  which  I  have 
been  able  to  establish  an  acquaintance.  Telegraj)h 
and  skedaddle  are  as  regular  as  may  be;  but  we  say 
go,  went,  gone  ;  the  Romans  said  eo,  ire,  ivi,  ititin  ; 
and  the  irregularities,  dialectic  and  other,  of  the  Greek 
ei/At  (eimi),  are  multitudinous  and  anomalous.  Eng- 
lish pronouns  have  real  cases,  which  is  one  sign  of 
their  antiquity,  the  Anglo-Saxon  having  been  an  in- 
flected language ;  but  not  in  Anglo-Saxon,  in  Latin, 
or  in  any  other  inflected  language,  are  the  oblique 
cases  of  /  derived  from  it  more  than  they  are  in  Eng- 
lish. My,  me,  we,  our,  us,  are  not  inflections  of  /; 
but  neither  are  meus,  mihl,  me,  nos,  nostrum,  nobis, 


224  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

inflections  of  ego.  The  oblique  cases  of  pronouns  are 
furnished  by  other  parts  of  speech,  or  by  other  pro- 
nouns, from  which  they  are  taken  bodily,  or  composed, 
in  the  early,  and,  generally,  unwritten  stages  of  a  lan- 
guage. Between  the  pronoun  and  the  article  there 
is  generally  a  very  close  relation.  It  is  in  allusion 
to  this  fact  that  Sir  Hugh  Evans,  putting  William 
Page  to  school  (Merry  Wives  of  Windsor,  Act  IV. 
scene  1),  and  endeavoring  to  trip  the  lad, — though 
he  learned  the  trick  of  William  Lilly  the  grammarian, 
—  asks,  "  What  is  he,  William,  that  doth  lend  arti- 
cles ?  "  But  the  boy  is  too  quick  for  him,  and  replies, 
"  Articles  are  borrowed  of  the  pronoun,  and  be  thus 
declined  :  singulariter,  nomitiativo,  hie,  Time,  hoc." 

A  marked  instance  of  this  relationship  between  the 
pronoun  and  the  article,  and  an  instructive  example 
of  the  manner  in  which  pronouns  come  into  a  lan- 
guage, is  our  English  she,  which  is  borrowed  from  the 
Anglo-Saxon  definite  article  se,  the  feminine  form  of 
which  was  seS ;  and  this  definite  article  itself  origi- 
nally was,  or  was  used  as,  a  demonstrative  pronoun, 
corresponding  to  who,  that.  For  se  is  a  softened  form 
of  the  older  the  ;  and  /c  the,  he  the  are  Anglo-Saxon 
for  I  who,  he  who.  The  Anglo-Saxon  for  she  was 
heo  ;  the  masculine  being,  as  in  English,  he.  And  as 
a  definite  feminine  object  was  expressed  by  the  article 
seo,  it  has  been  supposed  that  the  likeness  in  form  and 
meaning  between  the  two  caused  a  coalition,  so  that 
from  heo  and  sheo  came  she.  But  this  must  have 
been  in  the  North,  if  at  all.  For  seo  or  scho,  the 
Northern  equivalent  to  heo,  seems  to  have  been  the 
direct  ancestor  of  our  she.  And  in  Gothic  si  or 
se  —  she  ;  where,  however,  there  is  again  the  kindred 
likeness  between  the  feminine  pronoun  and  the  article, 
sa,  so'=the. 


FORMATION  OF  PRONOUNS  225 

Our  possessive  neuter  pronoun  its,  to  which  refer- 
ence has  been  made  before,  came  into  the  language 
last  of  all  its  kin,  in  this  manner:  As  heo  was  the 
feminine  of  he,  hit  was  the  neuter.  From  hit  the  h 
was  dropped  by  one  of  the  vicissitudes  which  have  so 
often  damped  the  aspirations  of  that  unfortunate  let- 
ter. Now  in  it,  the  t  —  half  the  word  —  is  no  part  of 
the  original  pronoun,  but  the  mere  inflectional  ter- 
mination by  which  it  is  formed  from  he.  But  by  long 
usage,  in  a  period  of  linguistic  disintegration,  the  t 
came  to  be  looked  upon  as  an  essential  part  of  the 
word,  one  really  original  letter  of  which,  h,  had  been 
dropped  by  the  most  cultivated  writers.  This  letter, 
however,  long  held  its  place ;  and  in  the  usage  of  the 
common  people,  and  in  that  of  some  writers,  the 
Anglo-Saxon  hit  was  the  neuter  pronoun  nearly  down 
to  the  Elizabethan  period.  Of  both  the  masculine  he 
and  the  neuter  hit,  the  possessive  case  was  his,  just  as 
ejus  is  the  genitive  of  both  is  and  id  ;  and  so  his  was 
the  proper  lineal  possessive  case  of  it,  the  successor  of 
hit.  If  his  had  been  subjected  to  a  deprivation  like 
to  that  of  the  nominative,  by  an  elision  of  the  h,  and 
made  into  is,  there  would  have  been  no  apparent  rea- 
son to  question  its  relationship  to  it.  But  this  was 
not  to  be.  The  t,  not  the  h,  had  come  to  be  regarded 
as  the  essential  letter  of  the  word ;  his  was  looked 
upon  as  belonging  to  he,  and  not  to  it ;  and  to  the 
latter  was  added  the  s,  which  is  a  sign  of  possession 
in  so  many  of  the  Indo-European  languages.  But 
there  lingered  long,  not  only  among  the  uneducated 
peojile  who  continued  to  use  hit,  but  among  writers 
and  scholars,  a  consciousness  that  his  was  the  true 
possessive  of  it,  and  still  more  a  feeling  that  its  was 
an  illegitimate  pretender.     And,  indeed,  if  ever  word 


226  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

was  justly  called  bastard,  this  one  deserves  tbe  stigma. 
But  like  some  other  bastards,  it  has  held  the  place  it 
seized,  and  justified  the  usurpation  by  the  service  it 
has  rendered.^ 

This  is  the  history  of  a  pronominal  form  which  was 
excluded  from  our  English  Bible  (a.  d.  1611),  which 
was  used  but  nine  times  by  Shakespeare,  and  instead 
of  which  we  find  Ms,  her,  and  even  it  late  in  the  seven- 
teenth century.  A  singular  idiom,  the  own,  express- 
ing reflective  possession,  was  in  use  between  1350  and 
1600.  Here  the  does  not  stand  for  its  ;  the  old  pos- 
sessive hit  having  been  in  general  use  as  late  as  1500. 
Besides,  the  own  expressed  plural  as  well  as  singular 
possession. 

The  formation  of  certain  other  possessive  pronouns 
Is  somewhat  like  that  of  its.  These  are  the  absolute 
possessives  hers,  ours,  yours,  and  theirs,  all  of  which 
are  made  by  adding  the  singular  possessive  suffix  s  to 
an  already  possessive  form,  which  in  the  last  three  is 
plural  —  a  striking  irregularity.  These  absolute  pos- 
sessive pronouns  are  thus  double  possessives.  The 
others,  mine  and  thine,  are  only  old  possessive  forms 
which  have  been  set  apart  for  use  absolutely.  It  is 
in  analogy  with  them  that  the  vulgar  absolute  posses- 

1  Some  doubt  yet  prevails  as  to  the  origin  of  the  use  of  his  as 
a  sign  of  the  possessive  case,  as,  John  his  book.  May  it  not  have 
come  in  thus  ?  Es  or  is,  the  possessive  inflection,  was  first  sepa- 
rated from  the  noun  ;  e.  g.,  — 

"  &  the  sweetest  tyring  that  is  to  gosshawke  &  sperhawke  is  a  pigge  is  tayle." 
"  Anoynt  the  hawke  is  erys  with  oyle  of  olive,"  etc. 

Book  of  Hawking  (tern.  Henry  VI.),  Belig.  Aniiq.  I.  29G,  301. 

The  separation  effected,  is  was  aspirated,  and  supposed  to  be 
the  pronoun.  A  pigge  his  tayle  and  John  his  book  are  not  easily 
distinguishable  from  a  pigg-es  tayle  and  Johu-es  book.  Hence 
the  confusion  of  the  two. 


FORMATION   OF   PRONOUNS  227 

Bives  Jils7i,  hern,  ourn,  yourn,  and  theirn  are  formed. 
Remarkably,  in  the  feminine  personal  pronoun,  and 
in  no  other,  both  the  possessive  and  objective  relation 
are  expressed  by  the  same  form,  her.  This  results 
from  the  fact  that  the  Anglo-Saxon  hire,  the  genitive 
and  dative  of  heo  =  she,  took  the  place  of  the  accusa- 
tive hi.  It  has  long  been  established  that  the  objec- 
tive of  English  pronouns  was  formed  upon  the 
Anglo-Saxon  dative.  In  the  case  of  heo,  however,  not 
only  were  the  genitive  and  dative  identical,  but  hh'e, 
in  both  the  genitive  and  dative  use,  went  through  the 
same  changes,  hire,  heore,  here,  hir,  in  passing  into 
her,  upon  which  hers  was  formed,  and  which  has  long- 
been  used  provincially  as  a  nominative.  This  iden- 
tity of  the  feminine  genitive  and  dative  is  common  in 
Anglo-Saxon  pronouns. 

To  these  illustrations  of  the  way  in  which  pronouns 
find  their  way  into  a  language,  I  will  add  one  other 
example  of  this  taking  of  a  part  of  an  original  word 
as  a  stem.  Had  we  lived  three  hundred  years  ago, 
we  should  have  said  about  the  season,  July,  when  I 
am  writing,  that  we  liked  pison  for  dinner.  But  by 
this  we  should  not  have  meant  that  fluid  which  is 
sung,  cold,  in  the  touching  ballad  of  "  Villikins  and 
liis  Dinah,"  but  simply  peas  ;  and  we  should  have 
pronounced  the  word,  not  py-son,  but  pee-son.  Pison 
or  pisen  is  merely  the  old  plural  in  e?i  (like  oxcji, 
hrethre7i)  of  pise  (pronounced  j;eese),  the  name  of 
the  vegetable  which  we  call  pea.  Our  forefathers 
said  a  pise,  as  we  say  a  pea.  When  the  old  plural  in 
en  was  dropped,  jnse  (peese)  came  to  be  regarded  as 
a  plural  in  s  of  a  supposed  singular,  jn  (pronounced 
pee)  ;  and  by  this  backward  movement  toward  a  non- 
existent starting-point,  we  have  attained  the  word  j^ea. 


228  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

To  return  to  our  subject.  The  British  parliament 
is  called  omnipoteut,  and  a  majority  may,  by  a  single 
vote,  change  the  so-called  British  Constitution,  as  a 
majority  of  Congress  may,  if  it  will,  set  at  naught  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States.  But  neither  Par- 
liament nor  Congress,  not  both  of  them  by  a  concur- 
rent vote,  could  make  or  modify  a  pronoun  in  the 
language  common  to  the  nations  for  which  they 
legislate. 

I  shall  endeavor  to  answer  another  and  a  difficult 
question  which  has  been  lately  asked  as  to  the  forma- 
tion of  pronouns.  Why  do  we  say  myself^  yourself^ 
ourselves,  using,  as  it  appears,  the  possessive  form  of 
the  pronoun,  and  yet  himself,  themselves,  using  the 
objective?  No  reason  has  been  discovered  for  this 
anomaly  ;  but  its  history  is  traceable.^     The  emphatic 

1  The  question  was  asked  by  Mr.  Edward  S.  Gould,  author  of 
Good  English,  a  book  full  of  counsel  and  criticism  that  justi- 
fies its  title.  His  communication  appeared  in  The  Round  Table 
of  April  10;  and  the  above  reply,  forming  the  remainder  of  the 
present  chapter,  appeared  April  24,  in  the  same  paper,  under 
date  of  April  10.  An  explanation,  substantially  the  same,  was 
subsequently  given  in  The  Round  Table  of  June  5  by  Mr.  Thomas 
Davidson,  of  St.  Louis,  an  accomplished  scholar  and  etymologist, 
who  tlius  introduced  his  remarks  :  — 

"  Mr.  Gould's  other  difficulty  is  one  which  he  shares  with  a 
very  large  number  of  scholars.  It  is  a  real  one,  and  I  have 
never  seen  in  any  book  a  definite  solution  of  it.  I  will,  therefore, 
ask  leave  to  state,  at  some  length,  the  results  of  my  own  re- 
searches and  conclusions  in  regard  to  it,  acknowledging,  at  the 
same  time,  my  indebtedness  to  the  works  of  Koch,  Matzner, 
Grein,  and  other  German  scholars." 

I  am  thus  led  to  believe  that  my  own  solution  of  this  question 
is  the  first  that  was  given.  For  what  Mr.  Davidson  does  not 
know  of  philological  literature  can  be  hardly  worth  knowing  ; 
and  I  refer  to  his  article,  not  to  imply  that  he  took  any  hint 
from  mine  (than  which  hardly  any  supposition  could  be  more 


FORMATION   OF   PRONOUNS  229 

compound  pronoun  has  come  directly  down  to  us 
from  tlie  Anglo-Saxon,  in  which  it  was  formed  by  the 
union,  although  not  the  compounding,  of  the  pronoun 
ic  (I),  and  the  pronominal  adjective  .sy//'(self).  The 
adjectival  force  of  the  latter  word  continued  long  un- 
impaired. In  the  "  Cursor  Mundi,"  a  Middle  English 
metrical  version  of  parts  of  the  Bible,  Christ  says, 
"  For  I  am  self  man  al  perfite,"  /.  e.,  I  am  very  man 
all  perfect ;  and  even  in  "  Twelfth  Night "  Shakespeare 
wrote,  "  with  one  LseZ/king,"  which  the  revisers  of  the 
text  for  the  folio  of  1632,  not  apprehending,  altered 
to  "  with  one  seli-sa?ne  king."  But  the  Anglo-Saxon 
ic  (I)  and  sylf  (self)  were  both  declined  ;  and  when 
they  were  united  they  still  were  both  declined.  So,  as 
we  have  res-publica,  7'ei-inihliccB,  res-puhlicce,  rerum- 
jnthlicarum,  and  so  forth,  in  Latin,  we  have  ic  sylf, 
min  sylfes,  ive  sylfe,  nre  sylfra^  in  Anglo-Saxon ;  the 
third  person  being,  in  the  singular,  —  nom.  he  sylf^ 
gen.  his  sylfes,  dat.  him  syJfinn,  ace.  hine  sylfne,  and 
in  the  plural,  —  nom.  hi  sylfe,  gen.  hira  sylfra,  dat. 
him  sylfum,  or  Aeom  sylfuTn,  ace.  hi  sylfe.  But  by 
tlie  process  of  phonetic  degradation  these  double-case 
inflections  were  broken  down,  and  a  compound  em- 
phatic pronoun  was  formed,  not  from  either  the  nom- 
inative case  or  the  accusative,  but  from  the  dative  or 
the  genitive  ;  the  result  being,  not  I-self,  we-selves, 
he-self,  they-selves,  etc.,  but  my-self  (ine  sylfuni),  oiir- 
selves  Qure  sylfrum'),  him-sclf  (Jiim-sylfiim,^^  them- 
selves (Jieomj  sylfuin),  and  so  forth ;  but  us-selven 
appears    in    Henry  III.'s    proclamation   A.   D.   1258. 

presumptuous),  but  to  claim  for  the  latter  the  support  of  a  judg- 
ment formed  by  bis  acumen  and  research,  and  resting  on  the 
labors  of  the  learned  German  philologists  whom  he  mentions/ 
and  with  whose  works  I  am  unacquainted. 


230  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

Later  we  find  such  forms  as  ich-silf  and  me-silf,  thit- 
sllf  and  ^Ae-se^  alternating.  Within  a  century,  how- 
ever, we  find  the  modern  form  fully  established. 
Thus,  in  the  romance  of  "  Sir  Perceval  of  Galles," 
about  A.  D.  1350  :  — 

"  Sone  thou  hast  takyne  thy  rede 
To  do  thiselfe  to  the  dede." 

"  His  stede  es  in  stable  sett 
And  hymselfe  to  the  haulle  fett." 

"  The  sowdane  sayse  he  will  her  ta, 
The  lady  wille  hir-selfe  sla, 
Are  he  that  is  her  maste  fa  [i.  e.,  greatest  foe] 
Solde  wedd  hir  to  wyfe." 

"  Ane  unwyse  man,  he  sayd,  am  I 
That  puttis  my  self e  to  siche  a  foly." 

What  determined  the  selection  of  the  case  form  for 
preservation  can  only  be  conjectured.  It  may  have 
been  accident ;  but  mere  accident  has  little  influence 
upon  the  course  of  language  ;  and  the  notion  that  self 
expressed  an  identity  possessed  by  or  pertaining  to 
the  subject  of  the  pronoun  may  have  led  to  the  choice 
of  the  genitive  or  the  dative  case,  and  this  selection 
may  have  been  helped  by  considerations  of  euphony, 
or  ease  of  utterance. 

The  vulgar  use  of  Ms-self  as,  for  example,  "  Sam 
was  a-cleanin  of  his-self,"  springs  from  the  notion  of 
the  substantive  character  of  self  and  is  not  an  error 
that  illiterate  people  have  fallen  into,  but  a  remnant 
of  an  old  usage ;  educated  people,  as  well  as  the  un- 
educated, having  very  early  framed  their  speech  upon 
this  notion.  Thus  in  Bishop  Bale's  "  English  Vota- 
ries :  "  "  But  Marianus  sayth  she  was  a  presbyteresse, 
or  a  prieste's  leman,  to  save  the  honour  of  that  ordre, 


FORMATION  OF  PRONOUNS  231 

bycause  he  was  a  monk  his  selfe  "  (fol.  91,  ed.  15G0, 
ei  i^dsshii)  ;  and  Tyndale  in  his  version  of  the  Bible 
has  (Job  xxii.  24),  "  Yee  the  Allmightie  his  own  selfe 
shall  be  thy  harvest." 

I  have  called  this  use  of  the  pronoun  an  idiom  of 
our  language  ;  but  it  has  a  parallel  in  the  French  use 
of  moi,  tot,  and  lui.  The  French  do  not  sajje  meme^ 
tu  meme,  il  meme,  but  moi  meme,  toi  meme,  lui  meme^ 
in  which  the  pronouns  are  dative  forms,  the  remnants 
of  the  Latin  mihi,  tihi,  and  illi.  But  in  old  French 
the  nominative  was  used.  I  have  carefully  examined 
early  French  chansons  and  romansy  including  the 
"  Chanson  de  Roland  "  and  the  "  Roman  de  Tristan," 
and  have  found  not  a  single  instance  of  moi,  toi,  or 
lui  used  other  than  objectively,  and  generally  after  a 
preposition.  The  modern  Frenchman  says  ni  moi : 
his  forefathers,  eight  hundred  years  ago,  said  ne  io, 
where  the  pronoun  is  a  degraded  form  of  ego,  which 
became  jo,  and  finally  Jey  so  that,  according  to  cor- 
rect lineal  descent,  the  modern  French  should  be  nije. 
Louis  XIV.  said,  L''etat,  c'est  moi;  Hugh  Capet 
Would  have  said,  est  jo  ;  as  the  King  of  Spain  still 
signs  himself,  grandly,  Yo  el  Hey.  Is  it  not  possible, 
therefore,  that  in  the  phrase,  not  entirely  vulgar.  It  is 
me,  which  Dean  Alford  has  defended  on  insufficient 
grounds,  and  Mr.  Moon  has  attacked  without  suffi- 
cient knowledge,  the  pronoun  is  not  a  misused  accusa- 
tive, but,  as  in  the  exactly  correspondent  French 
phrase,  a  remnant  of  the  dative?  It  is  me  is  not 
Anglo-Saxon  certainly,  in  which  language  we  have  Ice 
com  hit,  a  form  preserved  by  early  English  writers  of 
repute.  But  if  I  remember  rightly,  the  phrase  in 
question  may  be  traced  back  to  a  very  respectable 
antiquity. 


232  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

We  find,  then,  that  hiinself  and  themselves  are 
not  objective  or  accusative  forms,  but  remnants  of  a 
dative  form,  which,  by  phonetic  degradation,  have  be- 
come, so  to  speak,  the  nominative  cases  of  indeclinable 
emphatic  pronouns  of  the  third  person.  So  herself 
is  not  possessive,  but  a  like  remnant  of  a  dative  form. 
Itself,  notably,  is  not  possessive,  not  a  compound  of  its 
and  self,  it  having  been  used  for  centuries  before  the 
appearances  of  its  in  the  language.  And  until  a  very 
late  period,  after  A.  D.  1600,  it  was  written  separately, 
it  self.  We  do  use  self  with  a  possessive,  as  "  Cae- 
sar's self  ;  "  and  our  Anglo-Saxon  forefathers  joined 
it  to  proper  names,  as  Petrus  sylf,  Crist  sylf.  But 
here  I  must  stop,  not  only  to  avoid  prolixity,  but  be- 
cause the  etymology  and  relations  of  self  is  one  of  the 
most  difficult  and  least  understood  subjects  in  the  his- 
tory of  our  language. 

SOME 

Several  correspondents  have  asked  me,  in  the  words 
of  one  of  them,  "  not  to  forget  the  word  that  is  more 
misused  than  any  other  in  our  language  —  some. 
Thus,"  my  correspondent  continues,  "  people  say 
(writers  as  well  as  speakers)  there  were  some  six  or 
seven  hundred  persons  present,  there  are  some  ninety 
vessels,  when  they  mean  about,  or  when  some  is  en- 
tirely superfluous."  This  use  of  the  word  has  also 
been  recently  denounced  by  some  British  writers  on 
language,  who,  however,  have  given  no  good  reasons 
for  their  objections,  although  one  of  them  calls  atten- 
tion to  the  fact  that  some  of  our  best  writers  are  using 
the  word  carelessly.  Let  us  look  a  little  into  the  his- 
tory and  the  radical  signification  of  this  word,  an^ 
trace  this  use  of  it. 


SOME  233 

We  hear  all  around  us,  among  well-educated  people 
of  good  English  stock,  but  who  give  themselves  no 
care  about  their  use  of  words,  speaking  their  mother 
tongue  merely  as  they  have  learned  it  from  the  mouths 
of  their  kinsfolk  and  acquaintance,  such  phrases  as 
"  some  three  or  four,"  "  some  few."  Oliver  Wendell 
Plolmes,  whose  English,  as  well  as  whose  thought, 
merits  the  attention  and  admiration  of  his  readers,  says 
"  some  fifty  "  in  a  passage  in  "  The  Guardian  Angel." 
Thackeray,  in  one  of  his  lectures  on  the  Queen  Anne 
Wits,  has  this  passage :  — 

"  And  some  five  miles  on  the  road,  as  the  Exeter  fly  comes 
jingling  and  creaking  onwards,  it  will  suddenly  be  brought  to  a 
halt  by  a  gentleman  on  a  gray  mare,"  etc.,  etc. 

Prior  closes  his  epigram  on  "  Phillis's  Age  "  with 
the  line  — 

"  And  Phyllis  is  some  forty-three." 

Bacon  is  quoted  by  Dr.  Johnson  (not  upon  this 
point,  however)  as  using  not  only  the  phrase  "  some 
two  thousand,"  but  "  some  good  distance,"  "  some 
good  while ;  "  and  Raleigh,  in  one  of  his  letters,  has 
the  following  passage  :  — 

"  Being  encountered  with  a  strong  storm  some  eight  leagues 
to  the  westward  of  Sicily,  I  held  it  office  of  a  commander  to  take 
a  port." 

Shakespeare,  in  "  Richard  III.,"  writes,  — 

"  Has  she  forgot  already  that  brave  prince, 
Edward  her  lord,  whom  I,  some  three  months  since, 
Stabbed  in  my  angry  mood  at  Tewksbury  ?  " 

and  in  "  Twelfth  Night,"— 

"  Some  four  or 
All,  if  you  will." 

If  a  man  sin  against  the  English  language  by  usins; 


"  Some  four  or  five  attend  on  him  ; 
All,  if  you  will." 


234  WORDS   AND  THEIR   USES 

some  in  the  manner  in  question,  he  will  do  it  in  very 
good  company ;  and  is  it  not  better  to  sin  with  the 
elect  than  to  be  righteous  with  the  reprobate  ?  But 
in  the  determination  of  such  a  question  as  this  we 
must  not  defer  to  mere  usage.  I  repeat  that  there 
is  a  misuse  of  language  which  can  be  justified  by  no 
authority. 

Some  is  one  of  the  oldest  simple,  underived,  uncom- 
pounded,  and  unmodified  words  in  the  English  lan- 
guage, in  the  Anglo-Saxon  part  of  which  it  can  be 
traced  without  change,  as  som  or  sum,  generally  the 
latter,  for  a  thousand  years.  Its  meaning  during  that 
whole  period  seems  not  to  have  been  enlarged,  dimin- 
ished, or  inflected,  in  the  slightest  degree,  in  either 
popular  or  literary  usage.  That  meaning  is,  —  an 
indeterminate  quantity  or  number,  greater  or  less, 
considered  apart  from  the  whole  existing  number. 
Some  is  separative  ;  it  implies  others,  and  contrasts 
with  all.  It  is  segregative,  and  sets  apart,  either  a 
number,  though  indefinite,  from  another  and  generally 
a  larger  number,  or  an  individual  person  or  thing  not 
definite.  It  corresponds  not  only  to  the  Latin  all- 
quantum,  but  to  quidem  and  aliquis,  and  to  circiter. 
Such  has  been  its  usage  always  in  English  and  in 
Anglo-Saxon.  Let  us,  for  instance,  examine  the  pas- 
sage in  the  Gospels  about  the  centurion  and  his  sick 
servant.  It  begins  in  the  modern  version  (Luke  vii. 
2),  "  And  a  certain  centurion's  servant,  who  was  dear 
unto  him,  was  sick."  But  in  Wycliffe's  English  ver- 
sion, made  about  a.  d.  1385,  we  find,  "  Sothli,  a  ser- 
vant of  sum  man  centurio  hauying  yvel."  In  the 
Anglo-Saxon  version,  made  about  a.  d.  995,  it  is, 
"  Da  wses  sumes  hundred  mannes  l^eow  a  untrum." 
Again,  in  the  same  Gospel  (ix.  19},  "  Others  say  that 


SOME  235 

one  of  the  old  prophets  is  risen  again  ; "  which,  in  the 
Anglo-Saxon  version,  is  "  Sunie  Sait  sum  witega  of 
tSam  ealdum  aras."  Here  the  Greek  word  translated 
some  is  rts,  which  the  Vulgate  renders  qvidam  ;  and 
the  meaning  is,  clearly  enough,  an  indefinite  individ- 
ual of  a  certain  class.  But  the  word  may  be  used  to 
set  apart  indefinitely  two,  or  five,  or  fifty  individuals, 
as  well  as  one.  We  may  say,  a  certain  five,  or  a  cer- 
tain fifty,  as  well  as  a  certain  one ;  and  so,  some  five 
or  some  fifty.  And  such,  we  find,  was  the  very  best 
and  oldest  Anglo-Saxon  usage.  King  Alfred,  first 
in  scholarshij)  as  well  as  in  the  state,  and  the  writer 
of  the  purest  Anglo-Saxon  that  has  come  down  to  us, 
translated,  from  the  Latin,  Bede's  account  of  Caed- 
mon,  the  Anglo-Saxon  sacred  poet,  which  begins  (in 
English)  thus :  — 

"  lu  this  abbess's  minster  was  a  certain  brother  ('  quidam 
frater')  notably  glorified  and  honored  with  a  divine  gift,"  etc. 

This  Alfred  renders  thus :  — 

"  On  fisse  abbuddissan  mynstre  waes  sum  broSor  synderlice 
mid  godcunde  gyfe  gemsered  et  geweor];ad." 

In  his  translation  of  Boethius  (I  cite  here  from 
Bosworth)  he  has  the  following  passage  :  — 

"  pa,  woeron  hi  sume  ten  gear  on  J>am  gewinne." 

That  is,  Then  they  were  some  ten  years  in  the  war. 
I  find,  also,  in  the  "  Anglo-Saxon  Chronicle,"  this  pas- 
sage, which  relates  to  the  year  605,  but  was  written 
about  A.  D.  805  :  — 

"  Jj.'er  man  sloh  eae  cc  preosta  f>a  comon  (5ider  fjet  her  scoldan 
ge  biddan  for  Walana  here.  Seromail  w£es  gehateu  hyra  ealdor, 
86  set  bseerst  Sonou  fiftiga  sum." 

That  is,  "  there  they  slew,  also,  two  hundred  priests, 
who  came  thither  that  they  might  pray  for  the  British 


236  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

army.  Their  prince  was  named  Seromail,  at  whose 
hands  some  fifty  were  slain."  But  the  word,  in  this 
sense  of  a  separated,  although  indefinite  number  or 
individual,  goes  far  back  beyond  the  Anglo-Saxon, 
to  the  Gothic,  spoken  by  the  people  who  broke  into 
Dacia,  and  settled  there  in  the  second  century.  They 
became  Christians  very  early,  —  so  early  that  Ulphi- 
las,  their  bishop,  a  man  of  preeminent  learning  and 
ability,  made  a  translation  of  the  Gospels  for  them 
about  A.  D.  360,  which  exists  in  a  superb  manuscript, 
written  in  silver  and  golden  letters  upon  a  light-purple 
parchment,  and  known  as  the  Codex  Argenteus.  Re- 
ferring to  the  two  passages  from  Luke,  quoted  above, 
we  find  that  that  about  the  centurion  begins  thus  :  — 
"  Hundafade  fau  sumis  skalks  siukands,  swultawairfhya  ;  " 

and  that  about  John  the  Baptist  thus :  — 

"  Sumai  fan  J>atei  praufetus  sums  f>ize  airizane  usstoJ»." 

That  is,  some  centurion,  some  prophet ;  as  we  might 
say,  some  one  centurion  or  other,  some  two  or  three 
centurions.  So  that  the  Gothic  Ulphilas  used  some 
just  as  it  was  used  by  the  Anglo-Saxon  Alfred  and 
the  English  Wycliffe.  Returning  to  the  Anglo-Saxon, 
we  find  that  where  Moses  tells  us,  according  to  our 
modern  version  (Genesis  xlvi.  37),  that  "  all  the  souls 
of  the  house  of  Jacob  which  came  into  Egypt  were 
threescore  and  ten,"  the  Anglo-Saxon  translator  tells 
us  that  there  were  "  some  seventy  "  of  them  —  "  seo- 
fontigra  sum.''''  Our  examination  proves,  then,  that 
this  use  of  some,  which  is  objected  to,  in  so  many 
quarters,  as  inelegant  and  incorrect  English,  conforms 
strictly  to  the  meaning  which  the  word  has  had  among 
speakers  and  the  best  writers  ever  since  it  came  out 
of  the  darkness  a  thousand  and  half  a  thousand  years 


SOME  237 

ago ;  that  it  can  be  traced  from  Holmes  and  Thack- 
eray, through  Shakespeare,  and  Bacon,  and  Wycliffe, 
and  King  Alfred,  to  Uli^hilas,  the  Goth,  on  the  Da- 
cian  banks  of  the  Danube  ;  where,  we  may  be  sure, 
the  Emperor  Julian  heard  it,  as,  during  the  life  of 
Ulphilas,  and  before  Alaric  came  upon  the  stage,  he 
led  his  victorious  legions  down  that  river,  after  his 
splendid  campaign  against  the  Germans,  which  so  re- 
vived the  somewhat  tarnished  lustre  of  the  Roman 
arms.  In  fact,  this  idiom,  as  well  as  this  word,  is 
found,  without  variation,  in  the  oldest  Teutonic  dialect 
known  to  us,  and  is,  at  least,  a  thousand  years  older 
than  the  modern  English  language,  in  which  it  has 
been  preserved,  without  change,  both  in  the  writings 
of  scholars  and  in  the  common  speech  of  the  people. 
There  can  be  no  higher  aiithority,  no  better  reason, 
for  any  word  or  f oi-m  of  language,  than  that  it  springs 
from  a  simple  native  germ,  and  is  rooted  in  the  usage 
of  fifteen  hundred  years.  And  it  would  be  difficult 
to  find  in  any  tongue  another  word  or  phrase  which 
has  such  simplicity  of  origin  and  structure,  and  such 
length  of  authoritative  usage  in  its  support,  as  this, 
which  lias  offended  the  ears  of  some  half  a  dozen  of 
my  correspondents  and  some  three  or  four  British 
critics. 

It  is  not  my  purpose  to  enter  here  upon  the  defence 
of  good  English  words  and  phrases ;  but  I  have  gone 
somewhat  at  length  into  the  history  of  this  j^hrase, 
not  only  because  I  hoped  it  might  be  interesting  to 
my  readers,  but  because  the  denunciation  of  the  usage 
is  a  noteworthy  example  of  the  mistakes  that  may 
be  made  by  purists  in  language.  When  a  word,  a 
phrase,  or  an  idiom  is  found  in  use  both  in  com- 
mon speech   and  in  the   writings   of  educated  men, 


238  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

we  may  be  almost  sure  that  there  is  good  reason  for 
the  usage.  But  cultivated  and  well-meaning  people 
sometimes  take  a  scunner  against  some  particular 
word  or  phrase,  as  we  have  seen  in  this  case,  and  they 
flout  it  pitilessly,  and  think  in  their  hearts  that  it  is 
the  great  blemish  upon  the  speech  o£  the  day. 

And,  by  the  bye,  one  of  my  critics,  and  one  who  I 
fear  rates  my  judgment  and  my  knowledge  much  above 
their  desert,  finds  fault  with  my  own  English  (which  I 
am  far  from  setting  up  as  an  example,  having  neither 
time  nor  inclination  to  "  Blair-up  "  my  sentences),  be- 
cause I  use  the  phrase  Jirstrate  as  denoting  a  high 
degree  of  superiority,  which  he  says  "  will  hardly  be 
found  in  that  sense  in  serious  English  composition,  cer- 
tainly not  until  within  a  comparatively  recent  period." 
This  brought  to  my  mind  the  following  passage  from 
Sir  Walter  Scott's  "  Monastery  "  (chapter  xxviii.)  :  — 

"  The  companion  of  Astrophel,  the  flower  of  the  tilt-yard  of 
Feliciana,  had  no  more  idea  that  his  graces  and  good  parts  could 
attach  the  love  of  Mysie  Happer  than  a  first-rate  beauty  in  the 
boxes  dreams  of  the  fatal  wound  which  her  charms  may  inflict 
on  some  attorney's  apprentice  in  the  pit  ;  " 

and  this  also  from  Fielding's  "  Tom  Jones  "  (chapter 
iv.):- 

"  —  and  she  was  indeed  a  most  sensible  girl,  and  her  understand- 
ing was  of  the  first  rate." 

and  this  from  Earquhar  (Poems,  Letters,  and  Essays, 
A.  D.  1700,  p.  14)  :  — 

"  No  first-rate  beau  with  us,  drawn  by  his  six  before  and  his 
six  behind,"  etc. 

But  I  had,  I  need  hardly  say,  no  thought  of  these  pre- 
cedents when  I  wrote,  and  should  have  used  the  phrase 
without  scruple,  even  were  I  sure  that  it  had  never 


ADJECTIVES  IN   EN  239 

been  used  before.  Too  much  stress  is  generally  laid 
upon  the  authority  of  mere  previous  usage,  which  is 
not  at  all  necessary  to  the  justification  of  a  good  word 
or  phrase.  A  lawyer  of  distinction  once  said  to  me 
that,  before  a  jury,  he  had  needed,  and  on  the  spur  of 
the  moment,  had  made  and  used,  the  word  juxtapose^ 
adding  that  he  had  no  business  to  do  so,  but  that  it 
was  a  pity  that  there  was  no  such  word  in  the  language, 
or,  as  he  said,  in  the  dictionaries.  But  no  man  needs 
the  authority  of  a  dictionary  (even  such  authority  as 
dictionaries  have),  or  of  previous  usage,  for  such  a 
word  as  j^ixtajyose.  It  is  involved  in  juxtaposition  as 
much  as  interpose  and  transpose  are  in  interposition 
and  transpositio7i.  The  mere  fact  that  it  had  not 
been  used  before  this  occasion,  or  rather  that  no  maker 
of  dictionaries  had  happened  to  notice  it,  is  of  no 
moment  whatever.  Any  man  has  the  right  to  use 
a  word,  especially  a  word  of  such  natural  growth  and 
so  well  rooted  as  juxtapose,  for  the  first  time,  else  we 
should  be  poorly  off  for  language.  But  he  must  be 
wary  and  sure  of  his  ground ;  for  an  innovator  does 
his  work  at  his  own  proper  peril. 

ADJECTIVES    IN    EN 

Unless  a  stand  is  made  by  the  writers  and  speakers 
who  guide  the  course  of  language  (I  mean  not  only 
scholars  and  men  of  letters,  but  the  great  mass  of 
well-educated  and  socially-cultivated  people),  we  shall 
lose  entirely  a  certain  class  of  words  —  adjectives  in 
en  formed  from  nouns  —  which  contribute  nuich  to 
the  usefulness  and  beauty  of  our  language.  TJireaden 
is  hopelessly  gone,  and,  rarely  needed,  will  be  little 
missed.  Golden,  brazen,  leaden,  leathern,  wheaten, 
oateHf  and  waxen  are  in  more  or  less  advanced  stages 


240  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

of  departure.  They  all  appear  in  poetry,  but  are  not 
often  used  for  the  every-day  needs  of  life,  except  in 
figurative  language.  Most  people  would  say,  a  gold 
candlestick,  a  brass  faucet,  a  lead  pipe,  and  so  forth  ; 
but  a  golden  harvest,  a  brazen  face,  a  leaden  sky.  The 
most  untaught  or  the  most  eccentric  person  would 
hardly  say,  a  brass  face,  or  a  lead  sky.  The  adjective 
in  en  seems  to  be  restricted  to  the  expression  of  like- 
ness ;  whereas  it  was  formed  to  express  substance,  of 
course  including  likeness.  Golden,  meaning  made  of 
gold,  and,  of  course,  like  gold,  now  is  generally  used 
to  mean  the  latter  only ;  and  for  the  former  sense  the 
noun  gold  is  used  as  an  adjective.  This  is  to  be  de- 
plored, not  only  because  the  formation  in  question  is 
one  of  the  oldest  in  our  language,  but  because  its  loss 
is  a  real  impoverishment  of  our  vocabulary,  compell- 
ing us  to  put  one  word  to  two  uses,  and  also  because 
we  are  thereby  deprived  of  what  we  much  need  —  dis- 
syllables the  last  syllable  of  which  is  unaccented.  In 
proportion  as  a  language  is  without  such  words,  it 
lacks  one  of  the  chief  elements  of  a  flowing  rhythm, 
and  becomes  stiff  and  chalk-knuckled.  Compare  the 
sound  of  a  golden  crown,  a  leaden  weight,  a  wheaten 
loaf,  with  that  of  a  gold  crown,  a  lead  weight,  a  wheat 
loaf.  To  a  person  who  has  an  ear  for  rhythm  the 
former  is  agreeable,  the  latter  harsh  and  offensive. 
To  any  one  the  former  phrases  are  easier  of  utterance 
than  the  latter.  The  adjectives  in  en  can  be  saved 
if  we  will,  and  they  are  well  worth  saving.  If  those 
who  are  strong  enough  do  not  stretch  out  their  hands 
to  them,  we  shall  soon  be  wearing  wool  clothes  ;  we 
shall  not  know  the  difference  between  a  wooden  house 
and  a  wood-house ;  we  shall  be  talking  of  the  North 
States  and  the  South  States,  the  East  and  the  West 


EITHER   AND   NEITHER  241 

States ;  and  when  we  go  back  to  the  old  well,  we  shall 
find  there,  not  the  old  oaken  bucket,  but  an  oak 
bucket,  which,  in  losing  half  its  distinctive  epithet, 
will  have  lost  half  the  association,  and  all  the  beauty, 
•of  its  name.  In  an  old  inventory  before  me,  which 
was  :nade  about  the  year  IGOO,  there  are  these  items ; 
"  A  tynnen  quart,  lOd.  ;  a  square  tynnen  pot,  6(/." 
Ovei-bury,  in  his  "  Characters,"  writes  of  "  pellets  in 
eldern  guns  ;  "  Tubervile  of  "  a  pair  of  yarnen  socks." 
And  in  the  "  Apology  for  the  Lollards,"  supposed  to 
have  been  written  by  Wycliffe,  is  this  passage,  which 
contains  a  cluster  of  adjectives  in  en  formed  from 
substantives,  and  used  by  our  forefathers  five  hundred 
years  ago. 

"  As  the  hethuii  men  bed  sex  kyndis  of  simllacris  clayen,  treen, 
brasun,  stouun,  silvereu,  and  golden,  so  have  lordis  now  sex 
kyndis  of  prelatis." 

It  is  diffioalt  to  see  why  silveren  should  have  been 
dropped,  and  brazen  and  golden  retained.  Better  re- 
turn to  stonen  and  clayen  and  yarnen^  than  lose  golden 
and  its  fellows. 

EITHER   AND   NEITHER 

Either  is  a  singular  word.  It  expresses,  and  from 
Anglo-Saxon  times  has  expressed,  in  the  best  usage, 
one  of  two  rind  both  of  two.  As  hoth  means  two  taken 
together,  so  either  means  two  considered  separately. 
Thus,  "  Oil  either  side  of  the  river  was  the  tree  of  life," 
means  thit  the  tree  grew  on  both  sides  alike  ;  but, 
"Take  either  side  of  the  river,"  means  that  one  or  the 
other  of  fJie  two  sides  may  be  taken.  It  is  well  to  as- 
sert this '  ;laim  for  eitJier,  because  it  has  been  questioned 
by  some  purists.  It  is  almost  impossible  to  explain 
bow  this  Word  means  both  one  and  two,  and  how  it  can 


242  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

yet  be  used  without  causing  any  confusion  for  intelli- 
gent people.  Either^  being  compounded  of  the  Anglo- 
Saxon  seg,  every,  and  hwseper,  which  of  two,  and  so 
meaning  every  which,  or  one,  of  two,  should,  strictly, 
be  used  only  with  reference  to  two  objects.  Neither^ 
being  but  the  negative  of  either,  conforms  to  like 
usage.  But  for  a  very  long  period,  they,  particularly 
the  latter,  have  been  used  by  our  best  writers  in  rela- 
tion to  more  than  two  objects.     For  example, — 

"  Which  of  them  [the  ancient  Fathers]  ever  said  that  neither 
kings,  nor  the  whole  clergy,  nor  yet  all  the  people  together  are 
able  to  be  judges  over  you  ?  "  —  Bishop  Jewell's  Apology,  Part 
V.  c.  5. 

"  —  their  main  business  [that  of  sacred  writers]  is  to  abstract 
man  from  this  world,  and  to  persuade  liim  to  prefer  the  bare 
hope  of  what  he  can  neither  hear,  see,  nor  conceive,  before  all 
present  enjoyments  this  world  can  afford."  —  Hobbes's  Liberty 
and  Necessity,  Epistle. 

"Independent  morals  are  to  be  neither  Catholic,  Evangelic, 
Bnddhist,  nor  Atheistic."  —  Saturday  Review,  October  31,  1869. 

"  —  this  new  and  ambitious  organ  attacks  neither  Protestants 
,  like  M.  Guizot,  Catholics  like   its  orthodox  readers,  Israelites 
like  M.  Rothschild,  nor  Atheists  like  M.  Prudhon."  —  Idem. 

This  use  of  these  words,  although  not  defensible  on 
any  other  grounds  than  those  of  convenience  and  cus- 
tom, seems  likely  to  prevail,  and  it  were  well  if  no 
graver  errors  had  been  sanctioned  by  the  authority  of 
eminent  writers.  Either,  used  separately,  is  responded 
to  by  or,  and  neither  by  nor ;  thus  —  either  this  or 
that,  neither  this  nor  that.  This  rule,  which  is  abso- 
lute, is  frequently  violated.  Some  people,  not  unedu- 
cated, seem  to  think  that  if  either  has  been  preceded 
by  a  negation,  it  should  be  followed  by  nor.  They 
would  write,  for  instance,  a  passage  in  Bacon's  "  New 
Atlantis"  thus:  "We  never  heard  of  any  ship  that 


EITHER  AND  NEITHER  243 

had  been  seen  to  arrive  upon  any  shore  of  Europe  ; 
no,  nor  of  either  the  East  nor  the  West  Indies."  But 
Bacon  wrote,  correctly,  "  nor  of  either  the  East  or  the 
West  Indies."  The  introduction  of  a  second  nor  in 
such  sentences  involves  the  use  of  two  negatives  in  the 
same  assertion.     It  is  like,  He  hadn't  none. 

The  pronunciation  of  either  and  neither  has  been 
much  disputed,  but,  it  would  seem,  needlessly.  The 
best  usage  is  even  more  controlling  in  pronunciation 
than  in  other  departments  of  language ;  but  usage 
itself  is  guided,  although  not  constrained,  by  analogy. 
The  analogically  correct  pronunciation  of  these  words 
is  what  we  call  the  Irish  one,  ayther  and  nayther  ;  the 
diphthong  having  the  sound  which  it  has  in  many 
words  in  which  ei  is,  and  apparently  has  always  been  so 
pronounced  —  weight,  freight,  deign,  vein,  oheisance, 
etc.  This  sound,  too,  has  come  down  from  Anglo-Saxon 
times,  as  we  have  already  seen,  the  word  in  that  lan- 
guage being  mgper ;  and  there  can  be  no  doubt  that 
in  this,  as  in  some  other  respects,  the  language  of  the 
educated  Irish  Englishman  is  analogically  correct,  and 
in  conformity  to  ancient  custom.  His  pronunciation 
of  certain  syllables  in  ei  which  have  acquired  in  Eng- 
lish usage  the  sound  of  e  long,  as,  for  example,  con- 
ceit, receive,  and  which  he  pronounces  consayt,  resayve^ 
is  analogically  and  historically  correct.  JiJ  had  of  old 
the  sound  of  a.  long,  and  i  the  sound  of  e,  particularly 
in  words  which  came  to  us  from  or  through  the  Nor- 
man French.  But  ayther  and  nayther,  being  anti- 
quated and  Irish,  analogy  and  the  best  usage  require 
the  common  pronunciation  eether  and  neether.  For 
the  pronunciation  i-ther  and  ni-ther,  with  the  i  long, 
which  is  sometimes  heard,  there  is  no  authority,  either 
of  analogy  or  of  the  best  speakers.     It  is  an  affecta- 


244  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

tion,  and  in  this  country,  a  copy  of  a  second-rate  Brit. 
ish  affectation.  Persons  of  the  best  education  and  the 
highest  social  position  in  England  generally  say  eether 
and  Qieether. 

SHALL   AND    WILL. 

The  distinction  between  these  words,  although  very 
clear  when  it  is  once  apprehended,  is  liable  to  be  dis- 
regarded by  persons  who  have  not  had  the  advantage 
of  early  intercourse  with  educated  English  people.  I 
mean  English  in  blood  and  breeding ;  for,  as  the  trav- 
eller found  that  in  Paris  even  the  children  could  speak 
French,  so  in  New  England  it  is  noteworthy  that  even 
the  boys  and  girls  playing  on  the  commons  use  shall 
and  will  correctly ;  and  in  New  York,  New  Jersey,  and 
Ohio,  in  Virginia,  Maryland,  and  South  Carolina,  fairly 
educated  people  of  English  stock  do  the  same ;  while  by 
Scotchmen  and  Irishmen,  even  when  they  are  profes- 
sionally men  of  letters,  and  by  the  great  mass  of  the 
people  of  the  Western  and  Southwestern  States,  the 
words  are  used  without  discrimination,  or,  if  discrimi- 
nation is  attempted,  will  is  given  the  place  of  shall^ 
and  vice  versa.  It  is  much  to  be  regretted  that  an 
English  scholar  of  Mr.  Marsh's  eminence  should  have 
expressed  the  opinion  that  the  distinction  between 
these  words  "  has,  at  present,  no  logical  value  or  sig- 
nificance whatever,"  and  have  ventured  the  prediction 
that  "at  no  very  distant  day  this  verbal  quibble  will 
disappear,  and  that  one  of  the  auxiliaries  will  be  era- 
ployed  with  all  persons  of  the  nominative,  exclusively 
as  the  sign  of  the  future,  and  the  other  only  as  an 
expression  of  purpose  or  authority." 

The  distinction  between  shall  and  will,  as  auxiliary 
verbs  to  be  used  with  various  persons  as  nominatives, 
is  a  verbal  quibble,  just  as  any  distinction  is  a  quibble 


SHALL   AND   WILL  245 

to  persons  too  ignorant,  too  dull,  or  too  careless  for  its 
apprehension.  So,  and  even  yet  more,  is  the  distinc- 
tion between  be,  am,  art,  is,  and  are,  a  quibble.  All 
these  words  express  exactly  the  same  thought  —  that 
of  present  existence.  Why,  tlierefore,  should  not  the 
distinction  between  them,  which  assigns  them  to  vari- 
ous persons  as  nominatives,  be  swept  away,  so  that, 
instead  of  entangling  ourselves  in  the  subtle  intri- 
cacies of  I  am,  thou  art,  he  is,  we  are,  you  are,  they 
are,  which  are  of  no  logical  value  or  significance,  we 
may  say,  with  all  the  charm  and  force  of  simplicity,  / 
he,  thou  he,  he  he,  we  he,  you  he,  they  hef  —  as,  in 
fact,  some  very  worthy  people  do,  and  manage  to  make 
themselves  understood.  Why,  indeed,  should  we  suf- 
fer a  smart  little  verbal  shock  when  the  Irish  servant 
says,  "  Will  I  put  some  more  coal  on  the  fire?"  And 
why  should  we  be  so  hard-hearted  as  to  laugh  at  the 
story  of  the  Frenchman,  who,  falling  into  the  water, 
cried  out,  as  he  was  going  down,  "  I  vill  drown,  and 
nobody  shall  help  me  "  ?  But  those  who  have  genuine, 
well-trained  English  tongues  and  ears  are  shocked, 
and  do  laugh.  The  reason  of  the  distinction  is  re- 
garded by  most  writers  upon  language  as  very  difficult 
of  explanation.  Essays  have  been  written  upon  the 
question ;  Sir  Edmund  Head  even  made  a  little  book 
about  it ;  but  no  one  has  yet  traced  the  usage  to  its 
origin  so  clearly  as  to  satisfy  all  philologists.  With- 
out pretending  to  do  what  so  many  others  have  failed 
to  do,  I  shall  give  the  explanation  that  is  satisfactory 
to  me. 

The  radical  signification  of  vnll  (Anglo-Saxon 
willari)  is  purpose,  intention,  determination ;  that  of 
shall  (Anglo-Saxon  sceal,  ought)  is  obligation.  / 
will  do  means,  I  purpose  doing — I  am  determined  to 


246  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

do.  /  shall  do  means,  radically,  I  ought  to  do ;  and 
as  a  man  is  supposed  to  do  what  he  sees  he  ought  to 
do,  /  shall  do  came  to  mean,  I  am  about  doing  —  to 
be,  in  fact,  a  mere  announcement  of  future  action, 
more  or  less  remote.  But  so  you  shall  do  means, 
radically,  you  ought  to  do ;  and  therefore  unless  we 
mean  to  impose  an  obligation  or  to  announce  an  action 
on  the  part  of  another  person,  over  whom  we  claim 
some  control,  shall,  in  speaking  of  the  mere  future 
voluntary  action  of  another  person,  is  inappropriate ; 
and  we  therefore  say  you  will^  assuming  that  it  is  the 
volition  of  the  other  person  to  do  thus  or  so.  Hence, 
in  merely  announcing  future  action,  we  say,  I  or  we 
shall,  you,  he,  or  they  will ;  and,  in  declaring  purpose 
on  our  own  part,  or  on  the  part  of  another,  obligation, 
or  inevitable  action,  which  we  mean  to  control,  we  say, 
I  or  we  will,  you,  he,  or  they  shall.  Official  orders, 
which  are  in  the  form  you  ivill,  are  but  a  seeming 
exception  to  this  rule  of  speech,  which  they,  in  fact, 
illustrate.  For  in  them  the  courtesy  of  superior  to 
subordinate,  carried  to  the  extreme  even  in  giving 
command,  avoids  the  semblance  of  compulsion,  while 
it  assumes  obedience  in  its  very  language.  Should 
and  would  follow,  of  course,  the  fortunes  of  shall  and 
will ;  and,  in  the  following  short  dialogue,  I  have 
given,  I  believe,  easily  apprehended  examples  of  all 
the  proper  uses  of  these  words,  the  discrimination  of 
which  is  found  by  some  persons  so  difficult.  A  hus- 
band is  supposed  to  be  trying  to  induce  his  reluctant 
wife  to  go  from  their  suburban  home  to  town  for  a 
day  or  two. 

He.     I  shall  go  to  town-tomorrow.     Of  course  you  will  ? 

She.  No,  thanks.  I  shall  not  go.  I  shall  wait  for  better 
weather,  if  that  will  ever  come.  When  shall  we  have  three  fair 
days  together  again  ? 


SHALL  AND   WILL  247 

He.     Don't  mind  that.    You  should  go.    I  should  like  to  have 
you  hear  Ronconi. 
.    She.     No,  no  ;  I  will  not  go. 

He.  \To  Mrnself.']  But  you  shall  go,  in  spite  of  the  weather 
and  of  yourself.  [To  her.']  Well,  remember,  if  you  should 
change  your  mind,  I  should  be  very  happy  to  have  your  com- 
pany. Do  come  ;  you  will  enjoy  the  opera  ;  and  you  shall  liave 
the  nicest  possible  supper  at  Delmonico's. 

She.  No  ;  I  should  not  enjoy  the  opera.  There  are  no  sing- 
ers worth  listening  to  ;  and  I  would  n't  walk  to  the  end  of  the 
drive  for  the  best  supper  Delmonico  will  ever  cook.  A  man 
seems  to  think  that  any  human  creature  would  do  anything  for 
something  good  to  eat. 

He.     Most  human  creatures  will. 

She.  I  shall  stay  at  home,  and  you  shall  have  your  opera  and 
your  supper  all  to  yourself. 

He.  Well,  if  you  will  stay  at  home,  you  shall  ;  and  if  you 
won't  have  the  supper,  you  shan't.  But  my  trip  will  be  dull 
without  you.  I  shall  be  bored  to  death  —  that  is,  unless,  indeed, 
your  friend  Mrs.  Dashatt  Mann  should  go  to  town  to-morrow, 
as  she  said  she  thought  that  she  would  ;  then,  perhaps,  we 
shall  meet  at  the  opera,  and  she  and  her  nieces  will  sup  with 
me. 

She.  [  To  herself.']  My  dear  friend  Mrs.  Dashatt  Mann  !  And 
so  that  woman  will  be  at  her  old  tricks  with  my  husband  again. 
Bat  she  shall  find  that  I  am  mistress  of  this  situation,  in  spite 
of  her  big  black  eyes  and  her  big  white  shoulders.  \_To  him.] 
John,  why  should  you  waste  yourself  upon  those  ugly,  giggling 
girls  ?  To  be  sure,  she  's  a  fine  woman  enough  ;  that  is,  if  you 
will  buy  your  beauty  by  the  pound  ;  but  they  ! 

He.  Oh,  think  what  I  will  about  that,  I  must  take  them,  for 
politeness'  sake  ;  and,  indeed,  although  the  lady  is  a  matron,  it 
would  n't  be  quite  proper  to  take  her  alone  —  would  it  ?  What 
should  you  say  ? 

She.  Well,  not  exactly,  perhaps.  But  it  don't  much  matter  ; 
she  can  take  care  of  herself,  I  should  think.  ■  She  's  no  chicken  ; 
she  '11  never  see  thirty-five  again.  But  it 's  too  bad  you  should 
be  bored  with  her  nieces  —  and  since  you  're  bent  on  having  me 
go  with  you  —  and  —  after  all,  I  should  like  to  hear  Ronconi  — 
and  —  you  shan't  be  going  about  with  those  cackling  girls  — < 
well,  John  dear,  I  '11  go. 


248  WORDS  AND   THEIR  USES 

The  only  passage  in  this  colloquy  which  seems  to 
me  to  need  a  word  of  explanation,  is  that  in  which 
the  lady  says  to  herself  that  her  friend  Mrs.  D.  Mann 
"  shall  find "  that  some  one  else  is  mistress  of  the 
situation.  It  would  have  been  quite  correct  for  the 
wife  to  say  "  she  vnll  find,"  etc.  But,  in  that  case, 
she  would  merely  have  expressed  an  opinion  as  to 
a  future  occurrence.  By  using  shall,  she  not  only 
predicts  with  emphasis,  but  claims  the  power  to  make 
her  prediction  good.  I  have  given  vaj  readers  this 
colloquy,  because  more  can  be  gained  toward  the 
proper  use  of  these  words  through  example  than  from 
precept.  It  seems  to  be  instinctively  apprehended  — 
imbibed.  Association  and  early  habit  cause  many 
people,  who  are  far  from  being  well  educated,  and 
who  are  entirely  unconscious  as  to  their  speech,  to  be 
unerring  in  their  use  of  this  idiom,  which,  in  my 
judgment,  is  one  of  the  finest  in  the  language. 

It  is  violated  with  conspicuous  perversity  in  the 
following  examples.  The  first  is  from  Coverdale's 
version  of  the  Bible  :  — 

"  And  Gedeon  sayde  unto  God,  Yf  thou  wilt  delyuer  Israel 
thorow  my  hande,  as  thou  hast  saide,  then  wil  I  laye  a  flese  of 
woll  in  the  courte  :  yf  y°  dew  be  onely  upon  y"  flese,  and  dry 
upon  all  the  grounde,  then  wyll  I  perceaue  that  thou  shall  de- 
lyver  Israll  thorow  my  hande,  as  thou  hast  said."  —  Judges  vi. 

Here,  in  the  last  sentence,  will  is  used  for  shall,  and 
shall  for  wilt.  Gideon  meant  to  express  merely  a 
future  occurrence  in  both  cases,  and  to  imply  no  will 
on  his  own  part,  and  no  obligation  on  God's.  And 
thus,  in  the  King  James  version  of  the  same  jjassage, 
we  have  "  then  shall  I  know  that  thou  wilt  save 
Israel." 

The   next   example   is  from  a    "  Narrative   of  a 


SHALL   AND  WILL  249 

Grand  Festival  at  Yarmouth,"  in  honor  of  the  vic- 
tory of  Waterloo  (Yarmouth,  1815). 

"Every  individual  was  requested  to  take  his  place  at  the 
table,  .  .  .  and  it  was  requested  that  no  persons  would  leave 
their  seats  during  dinner." 

Here  the  right  word  is  should,  as  loould  and  should 
follow  the  regimen  of  will  and  shall,  and  we  request 
that  people  shall  do  thus  or  so,  not  that  they  v^ill 
do  it.  A  similar  error  appears  in  the  following  ex- 
tract from  an  account  published  in  the  "  New  York 
Tribune  "  of  the  interview  between  President  Grant 
and  a  committee  of  Pennsylvanians  who  waited  upon 
liim  to  urge  the  importance  of  appointing  a  Pennsyl- 
vanian  to  a  place  in  the  Cabinet. 

"  They  intended  making  no  suggestions  or  recommendations 
further  than  that  if  Pennsylvania  was  to  be  represented,  the  ap- 
pointment ivould  be  given  to  a  man  who  should  be  known  as  an 
unflinching  supporter  of  the  Republican  party." 

These  disinterested  gentlemen  meant  to  say,  and 
perhaps  did  say,  that  they  recommended  that  the 
appointment  should  be  given  to  a  man  who  woidd  be 
known  as  a  thorough-going  party-man. 

The  next  passage,  which  is  from  an  article  in  "  The 
World"  on  the  last  change  in  the  British  embassy 
at  Washington,  contains  an  example  of  a  monstrous 
misuse  of  will. 

"  Mr.  Thornton  was  without  any  suite,  as  it  is  intended  that  the 
staff  or  legation  formerly  attached  to  Sir  Frederick  Bruce  will 
act  under  the  orders  of  Mr.  Thornton  until  further  news  from 
the  Foreign  Office." 

Without  doubt,  the  writer  meant  that  it  is  intended 
that  the  staff  shall  act,  etc.  The  intention  was  to  lay 
a  future  obligation  upon  the  members  of  the  legation. 
We  cannot  intend  what  others  will  do. 


250  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

Another  New  York  journalist,  not  improbably  an 
Irishman,  exclaims,  as  these  pages  are  in  preparation 
for  the  press,  — 

"  When  will  we  get  througli  with  the  everlasting,  tedious,  un- 
profitable, and  demoralizing  Byron  controversy  ?  " 

He  meant,  When  shall  we  get  through  with  it  ? 

There  is  a  fine  use  of  shall,  the  force  of  which 
escapes  some  intelligent  and  cultivated  readers.  An 
example  is  found  in  the  following  passage  from  a 
number  of  "  The  Spectator,"  written  by  Addison  : 
"  There  is  not  a  girl  in  town,  but,  let  her  have  her 
will  in  going  to  a  mask,  and  she  shall  dress  like  a 
shepherdess,"  Upon  this  even  the  acute  and  gener- 
ally sound  Crombie  remarks  in  his  "  Etymology  and 
Syntax  of  the  English  Language  "  (p.  398,  ed.  1830), 
"  It  should  be  '  she  will.^  The  author  intended  to 
signify  mere  futurity  ;  instead  of  which  he  has  ex- 
pressed a  command."  But  mere  futurity  was  not 
what  Addison  meant  to  express,  nor  did  he  express  a 
command.  He  meant  to  assert  strongly  ;  and  there- 
fore, instead  of  the  word  will,  which  with  the  third 
person  predicates  simple  futurity,  he  used  shall,  which 
implies  more  or  less  of  obligation,  —  here  a  propensity 
so  strong  as  to  control  action.  So  in  the  Urquhart 
translation  of  Rabelais,  a  masterpiece  of  idiomatic 
English,  we  find  (Book  I.  ch.  17),  "A  blind  fiddler 
shall  draw  a  greater  confluence  together  than  an  evan- 
gelical preacher."  So  Dr.  Johnson  says,  in  the  pre- 
face to  his  Dictionary,  that  it  should  be  considered,  — 

"  —  that  sudden  fits  of  inadvertency  will  surprise  vigilance, 
slight  avocations  will  seduce  attention,  and  casual  ellipses  of  the 
mind  will  darken  learning  ;  and  that  the  writer  shall  often  in 
vain  trace  his  memory  at  the  moment  of  need  for  that  which 
yesterday  he  knew  with  intuitive  readiness,  and  which  will  come 
uncalled  into  his  thoughts  to-morrow." 


SHALL  AND  WILL  251 

Here  zoill  is  used  in  three  clauses,  and  shall  in  one, 
to  express  the  same  relation  of  time  in  the  third  per- 
son ;  but  the  latter  clause  would  lose  much  of  its  sig- 
nificance if  will  were  to  take  in  it  the  place  of  shall. 
And  in  the  prophecy  of  Isaiah,  "  He  shall  feed  his 
flock  like  a  shepherd  .  .  .  and  shall  gently  lead  all 
those  that  are  with  young,"  how  much  of  its  grandeur, 
as  well  as  of  its  power  of  assurance,  would  be  lost,  if 
will  were  substituted  for  shall !  Bishop  Jewell  nicely 
discriminates  (but  intuitively,  we  may  be  sure)  be- 
tween shall  and  will  thus  used,  in  the  following  pas- 
sage in  one  of  his  sermons :  — 

"  Let  us  turne  to  him  with  an  upright  heart.  So  shal  he  turne 
to  us  ;  so  shal  we  walke  as  the  children  of  light;  so  shall  we 
shine  as  the  sunne  in  the  kingdome  of  our  father  ;  so  shall  God 
be  our  God,  and  will  abide  with  us  forever."  —  Ed.  1583,  fol.  q.  iii. 

An  example  of  this  distinction,  unsurpassed  in  deli- 
cacy and  exactness,  and  consequent  effect,  is  found 
in  the  following  passage,  —  my  memorandum  of  the 
source  of  which  is  unfortunately  lost,  —  and  which 
refers  to  the  assassination  of  President  Lincoln  :  — 

"  It  justly  fastened  itself  upon  the  rebellion,  and  demanded 
new  and  severer  punishment  of  the  rebels,  instead  of  the  mag- 
nanimous reconciliation  which  the  beloved  President,  of  whom 
it  had  been  bereaved,  had  recommended.  Who  will  say  that  this 
sentiment  was  unnatural  ?  Who  shall  say  that  it  is  even  unjust  ?  " 

Here,  again,  will  and  shall  are  used  to  express  the 
same  time  in  regard  to  like  actions  of  the  same  person. 

"Will  might  have  been  used  correctly  in  the  latter 
question  as  it  was  in  the  former ;  but  some  force 
would  thereby  have  been  lost.  Shall  could  not  have 
been  used  with  the  same  fine  effect  in  both  questions. 

Will  having  been  used,  shall  intensifies  the  query. 
It  is  as  if  the  questions  were,  Who  can  say  that  this 


252  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

sentiment  was  unnatural  ?  Who  could  venture  to  say- 
that  it  is  even  unjust?  But  we  may  be  sure  that  no 
conscious,  careful  selection  of  these  words  was  made 
in  this  case.  And  we  may  be  even  surer  of  the  un- 
consciousness with  which  the  following  passage  was 
written,  in  a  letter  from  a  lady  to  a  friend  from  whom 
she  had  been  alienated,  and  who  sent  her  a  present 
which  she  felt  delicate  about  accepting.  The  subject 
is  commonplace,  and  the  writer  expresses  in  the  sim- 
plest language  a  feeling  natural,  yet  not  too  common. 
But  the  passage  is  so  remarkable  for  its  free  yet 
nicely  correct  use  of  idiom,  that  I  am  sure  the  writer, 
as  well  as  the  friend  to  whom  I  am  indebted  for  a 
sight  of  it,  will  pardon  its  appearance  here.  In  the 
last  sentence,  the  use  of  may^  instead  of  will^  which 
would  have  been  quite  proper,  shows  a  delicate  in- 
stinct in  the  use  of  language,  which,  as  I  have  said 
before,  is  characteristic  of  the  epistolary  style  of  in- 
telligent and  cultivated  women. 

"  I  thank  you  sincerely  for  still  thinking  of  me,  and  I  will 
keep  it  just  as  it  is  until  I  hear  from  you  again.  If  you  are 
willing  to  become  friends  with  me  once  more,  I  shall  only  be 
too  happy.  I  will  accept  it  as  a  seal  on  the  renewal  of  our 
friendship.  If  not,  then  I  will  return  it  and  what  you  gave  me 
before  we  parted.  Perhaps,  after  you  have  read  this  letter  to 
the  end,  you  may  not  wish  to  continue  our  acquaintance  ;  if  not, 

I   shall  come   back  to  ,   and  will   keep   my  engagements 

there,  and  then  go  home." 

Such  a  mastery  of  idiom  belongs  only  to  persons 
who,  having  grown  up  among  those  who  use  language 
correctly,  have  themselves  a  delicate  and  sure  sense  of 
the  various  significance  of  words.  It  is  not  so  common 
even  among  the  educated  as  to  be  taken  as  a  matter 
of  course  :  for  instance,  see  the  following  note,  jDrinted 
from   the   original,  which  was   written   by  a   distin* 


SHALL  AND  WILL  253 

guished  member  of  one  of  the  learned  professions  in 
New  York :  — 

"  I  enclose  to  you  a  document  which  your  interest  in  sanitary 
matters  will  doubtless  induce  an  appreciation  of  the  views  there- 
in expressed." 

"  I  should  feel  very  obligatory  to  you  if  you  could  fuid  a  good 

appointment  for  my  son  ,  to  enable  him  to  procure  a  free 

living  for  himself  and  his  family,  having  a  wife  and  2  children. 
He  is  intelligent,  industrious,  and  perfectly  reliable,  and  would 
devote  all  the  time  required  for  the  necessary  duty." 

Of  the  authors  of  these  two  specimens  of  letter 
writing,  the  lady  is  not,  I  believe,  highly  educated, 
and  her  intellectual  pretensions,  should  she  make  any, 
would  be  scouted  by  the  gentleman  ;  but  she  could  no 
more  fall  into  his  blundering  style  and  incorrect  use 
of  words  than  he  could  write  or  speak  with  her  simple 
clearness  and  unaffected  grace. 


CHAPTER  IX 

GRAMMAE,   ENGLISH   AND   LATIN 

The  first  punishment  I  remember  having  received 
was  for  a  f aihire  to  get  a  lesson  in  English  grammar. 
I  recollect,  with  a  half  painful,  half  amusing  distinct- 
ness, all  the  little  incidents  of  the  dreadful  scene : 
how  I  found  myself  standing  in  an  upper  chamber  of 
a  gloomy  brick  house,  book  in  hand,  —  it  was  a  thin 
volume,  with  a  tea-green  paper  cover  and  a  red  roan 
back,  —  before  an  awful  being,  who  put  questions  to 
me,  which,  for  all  that  I  could  understand  of  them, 
might  as  well  have  been  couched  in  Coptic  or  in  San. 
skrit ;  how,  when  asked  about  governing,  I  answered, 
"  I  don't  know,"  and  when  about  agreeing,  "  I  can't 
tell,"  until  at  last,  in  despair,  I  said  nothing,  and 
choked  down  my  tears,  wondering,  in  a  dazed,  dumb 
fashion,  whether  all  this  was  part  and  parcel  of  that 
total  depravity  of  the  human  heart  of  which  I  heard 
so  much  ;  how  then  the  being  —  to  whom  I  apply  no 
harsh  epithet,  for,  poor  man,  he  thought  he  was  doing 
God  service  —  said  to  me,  in  a  terrible  voice,  "  You  are 
a  stupid,  idle  boy,  sir,  and  have  neglected  your  task. 
I  shall  punish  you.  Hold  out  your  hand."  I  put  it 
out  halfway,  like  a  machine  with  a  hitch  in  its  gear- 
ing. "Farther,  sir."  I  advanced  it  an  inch  or  two, 
when  he  seized  the  tips  of  my  fingers,  bent  them  back 
so  as  to  throw  the  palm  well  up,  and  then,  with  a 


GRA3IMAR,   ENGLISH   AND   LATIN  255 

mahogany  rule,  much  bevelled  on  one  side,  and  hav- 
ing a  large  malignant  ink-spot  near  the  end,  —  an  in- 
strument which  seemed  to  me  to  weigh  about  forty 
pounds,  and  to  be  a  fit  implement  for  a  part  of  that 
eternal  torture  to  which  I  had  been  led  to  believe 
that  I,  for  my  inborn  depravity,  was  doomed,  —  he 
proceeded  to  reduce  my  little  hand,  only  just  well  in 
gristle,  as  nearly  to  a  jelly  as  was  thought,  on  the 
whole,  to  be  beneficial  to  a  small  boy  at  that  stage  of 
the  world's  progress. 

The  carefully  filed  and  still  preserved  receipts  of  a 
methodically  managed  household  enable  me  to  tell  the 
age  at  which  I  was  thus  awakened  to  the  sweet  and 
alluring  beauties  of  English  grammar.  I  was  just  five 
and  a  half  years  old  when  one  Alfred  Ely  —  may  his 
soul  rest  in  peace !  —  thus  gently  guided  my  uncertain 
and  reluctant  steps  into  the  paths  of  humane  learning. 
Fortunately,  my  father,  when  outside  the  pale  of  reli- 
gious dogma,  was  a  man  of  sound  sense  and  a  tender 
heart ;  and  as  there  was  nothing  about  English  acci- 
dence either  in  the  Decalogue  or  the  Common  Prayer- 
Book,  he  sent  a  message  to  the  schoolmaster,  which 
caused  that  to  be  my  last  lesson  in  what  is  called  the 
grammar  of  my  mother  tongue.  I  was  soon  after  I'c- 
moved  to  a  school  the  excellence  of  which  I  have  only 
within  a  few  years  fully  appreciated,  although,  as  a 
boy,  I  knew  that  there  I  was  happy,  and  felt  as  if  I 
were  not  quite  stupid,  idle,  and  depraved.^     There- 

^  Let  me  mention  with  respect  and  love,  which  have  grown 
with  my  years,  the  names  of  my  two  teachers,  Theodore  Eames 
and  Samuel  Putnam,  to  whom  I  owe  all  that  I  could  be  taught 
at  school  before  I  left  them  for  college.  I  know  that  should  any 
one  of  my  fellow-pupils  chance  to  see  these  lines,  he  will  declare 
with  me  that  the  boy  who  could  remain  even  a  year  under  their 
hands  without  profit  in  mind,  morals,  and  manners,  must  indeed 
bave  given  himself  up  to  original  sin. 


256  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

after  I  studied  English,  indeed,  but  only  in  the  works 
of  its  great  masters,  and  unconsciously  in  the  speech 
of  daily  companions,  who  spoke  it  with  remarkable 
but  spontaneous  excellence. 

My  kind  and  courteous  readers  will  pardon,  I  hope, 
this  reminiscence,  in  which  I  have  indulged  myself 
only  because  in  some  of  the  comments,  private  as  well 
as  public,  which  have  been  made  upon  these  chapters 
in  their  original  form,  I  have  seen  myself  called  a 
grammarian.  God  forbid  that  I  should  be  anything 
of  the  sort !  That  I  am  unversed  in  the  rules  of 
English  grammar  (so  called),  I  am  not  ashamed  to 
confess ;  for  special  ignorance  is  no  reproach  when 
unaccompanied  with  presumption.  And  that  in  which 
I  confess  that  I  have  no  skill,  I  have  not  undertaken 
to  teach.  That  task  I  leave  to  those  who  are  capable 
of  the  subject,  and  who  feel  its  necessity. 

If  grammar  is  what  it  has  been  defined  as  being, 
the  science  which  has  for  its  object  the  laws  which 
regulate  language,  the  remarks  just  made  cannot  be 
justified  :  for,  in  that  sense,  grammar  is  as  much  con- 
cerned with  words  by  themselves,  with  their  signifi- 
cation and  their  origin,  and  with  their  rightful  use  in 
those  regards,  as  with  their  relations  to  each  other  in 
the  sentence ;  and  it  is  in  that  sense  but  another  name 
for  the  science  of  language  —  philology.  But,  not- 
withstanding that  definition,  and  its  acceptance  by 
some  grammarians  and  some  compilers  of  dictionaries, 
such  is  not  the  sense  in  which  the  word  fjrammar  is 
generally  used.  Nor  can  the  position  which  I  have 
taken  be  maintained,  if  grammar  is  regarded  as  the 
science  of  the  rightful  or  reasonable  expression  of 
thought  by  language  ;  for  grammar  extended  to  these 
wide  limits  would  include  log^ic  and  rhetoric.     But 


GRAMMAR,  ENGLISH  AND   LATIN  257 

grammar,  in  its  usual  sense,  is  the  art  of  speaking  and 
writing  a  language  correctly  ;  in  which  definition,  the 
word  correctly  means,  in  accordance  with  laws  founded 
upon  the  relations,  not  of  thoughts,  but  of  words, 
and  determined  by  verbal  forms.  It  is  this  formal, 
constructive  grammar  which  seems  to  me  almost  if 
not  entirely  superfluous  in  regard  to  the  English  lan- 
guage. Long  ago,  before  any  attempt  had  been  made 
to  write  its  grammar,  that  language  had  worked  itself 
nearly  free  from  those  verbal  forms  which  control  the 
construction  of  the  sentence,  and  therefore  free  in 
the  same  degree  from  the  needs  and  the  control  of 
formal,  constructive  grammar.  And,  notably,  it  was 
not  until  English  had  cast  itself  firmly  and  sharply 
into  its  present  simple  mould  that  scholars  undertook 
to  furnish  it  with  a  grammar,  the  nomenclature  and 
the  rules  of  which  they  took  from  a  language  —  the 
Latin  —  with  which  it  had  no  formal  affinity,  to  which 
it  had  no  formal  likeness,  and  by  the  laws  of  which  it 
could  not  be  bound,  except  so  far  as  they  were  the 
universal  laws  of  human  thought.  Allusions  to  gram- 
mar and  to  its  importance  as  a  part  of  education 
abound  in  our  early  literature.  In  a  rhyming  exhor- 
tation to  a  child,  written  in  the  fifteenth  century,  these 
lines  occur :  — 

"  My  lefe  chyld  I  kownsel  ye 
To  furme  thi  vj  tens,  thou  awyse  ye ; 
And  have  mind  of  thy  clensoune 
Both  of  nowne  and  of  pronowne, 
And  ilk  case  in  plurele 
How  thai  sal  end,  awyse  the  wele  ; 
And  thi  participyls  forgete  thou  nowth, 
And  thi  comparisons  be  yn  thi  thowth  ; 
Tliynk  of  the  revele  of  the  relatyfe  ; 
And  then  schalle  thou  the  better  thryfe  ; 
And  how  a  verbe  schalle  be  furmede, 


^58  WORDS   AND  THEIR  USES 

Take  gode  hede  that  thou  be  not  stunnedc ; 

The  ablatyfe  case  thou  hafe  in  mynd, 

That  he  be  saved  in  hys  kynd  ; 

Take  gode  hede  qwat  he  wylle  do. 

And  how  a  nowne  substantyfe 

Wylle  corde  with  a  verbe  and  a  relatyfe, 

Posculo,  posco,  peto." 

Beliquice  Antiquce,  II.  14. 

But,  as  appears  on  its  face,  this  exhortation  refers 
not  to  English,  but  to  Latin  grammar,  which  was  the 
only  grammar  taught  or  thought  of  at  the  time  when 
it  was  written.  That  was  the  day  of  the  establish- 
ing and  endowing  of  grammar  schools  in  England  ; 
but  the  grammar  taught  in  them  was  the  Latin,  and 
afterward  a  little  of  the  Greek.  Chaucer  and  Wy- 
cliffe  had  written,  but  in  English  grammar  schools  no 
man  thought  of  teaching  English.  When,  at  last,  it 
dawned  upon  the  pedagogues  that  English  was  a  lan- 
guage, or  rather,  in  their  significant  phrase,  a  vulgar 
tongue,  and  they  set  themselves  to  giving  rules  for  the 
art  of  writing  and  speaking  it  correctly,  they  attempted 
to  form  these  rules  upon  the  models  furnished  by 
the  Latin  language.  And  what  wonder  ?  —  for  those 
were  the  only  rules  they  knew.  But  the  construction 
of  the  English  language  was  even  less  like  that  of 
the  Latin  than  English  words  were  like  Latin  words. 
From  this  heterogeneous  union  sprang  that  hybrid 
monster  known  as  English  grammar,  before  whose 
fruitless  loins  we  have  sacrificed,  for  nearly  three  hun- 
dred years,  our  children  and  the  strangers  within  our 
gates. 

Of  grammar,  the  essential  parts,  if  not  the  whole, 
are  etymology  and  syntax.  For  orthography  relates 
to  the  mere  arrangement  of  letters  for  the  arbitrary 
representation  of  certain  sounds,  and  prosody  to  the 


GRAMMAR,   ENGLISH   AND   LATIN  259 

aesthetic  use  of  language.  And,  if  prosody  is  a  part 
of  grammar,  why  shoukl  the  latter  not  include  rheto- 
ric, and  even  elocution  ?  In  fact,  grammar  was  long 
regarded  as  including  all  that  concerns  the  structure 
and  the  relations  of  language  ;  and  a  grammarian 
among  the  ancients  was  one  who  was  versed,  not  only 
in  language,  but  in  poetry,  history,  and  rhetoric,  and 
who,  generally,  lectured  or  wrote  upon  all  those 
branches  of  literature.  But  it  seems  to  me  that  in 
the  usage  of  intelligent  people  the  English  word 
grammar  relates  only  to  the  laws  which  govern  the 
significant  forms  of  words,  and  the  construction  of  the 
sentence.  Thus,  if  we  find  extraordinary  sjjelled  igs- 
trawnery^  or  hear  suggest  pronomiced  sujjest,  we  do 
not  call  these  lapses  false  grammar  ;  but  if  we  hear, 
"  She  was  hisn,  but  he  was  n't  liern^''  which  violates 
true  etymology,  or,  "  He  done  it  good^''  which  is  in- 
correct syntax,  these  we  do  call  false  grammar. 

Etymology,  which  relates  to  the  significant  forms 
of  words,  and  syntax,  the  rules  of  which  govern  their 
arrangement,  are,  then,  from  our  point  of  view,  the 
great  essentials,  if  not  the  whole,  of  grammar.  Now, 
the  principal  Latin  words,  the  noun,  the  adjective, 
the  verb,  the  participle,  and  the  adverb,  vary  their 
forms  by  a  process  called  inflection,  and  the  Latin  sen- 
tence is  constructed  upon  the  basis  of  those  significant 
verbal  forms.  English  words  do  not  vary  their  forms 
by  inflection,  and  the  English  sentence  is  constructed 
without  any  dependence  upon  verbal  forms.  To  this 
remark  there  are  exceptions  ;  but  they  are  so  few,  and 
of  such  small  importance,  that  they  cannot  be  regarded 
as  affecting  its  general  truth.  The  structure  of  the 
Latin  sentence  depends  upon  the  relation  of  the  words 
of  which  it  is  composed ;  that  of  the  English  sentence. 


260  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

upon  the  relation  of  the  thoughts  it  expresses.  In 
other  words,  the  construction  of  the  Latin  sentence 
is  grammatical,  that  of  the  English  sentence,  logical. 
At  the  first  offshooting  of  the  English  language  from 
its  parent  stem,  its  growth  and  development  began  at 
once  to  tend  toward  logical  simplicity,  —  in  fact,  that 
tendency  was  its  offshooting ;  and  since  then  it  has 
gradually,  but  surely  and  steadily,  cast  off  inflectional 
forms,  and  freed  itself  from  the  trammels  of  a  con- 
struction dependent  upon  them.  This  being  true,  how 
preposterous,  how  impossible,  for  us  to  measure  our 
English  corn  in  Latin  bushels  !  Yet  that  is  what 
we  have  so  long  been  trying  to  do  with  our  English, 
grammar. 

In  illustration  of  the  foregoing  remarks,  I  will  pre- 
sent and  compare  some  examples  of  Latin  and  Eng- 
lish words  and  sentences,  the  former  of  which  shall  be 
so  simple  that  they  can  hardly  escape  the  apprehen- 
sion even  of  those  who  have  not  received  the  training 
of  a  grammar  school. 

The  Latin  for  hoy  is  puer.  But  puer  stands  for 
hoy  only  as  the  subject  of  a  sentence.  When  the  boy 
spoken  of  is  the  object  of  an  action,  he  is  represented 
by  an  inflection  of  puer  —  the  word  puerum.  Boys 
as  the  subjects  of  an  action  are  called  pueri^  but  as 
the  objects,  pueros. 

The  Latin  for  girl  is  puella,  as  the  subject  of  a 
verb,  but  when  the  girl  is  the  object  of  the  action,  she 
is  not  represented  in  that  relation  by  changing  puella 
into  puellum^  as  puer  was  made  puerum^  but  the  word 
puella^  being  feminine,  becomes  puellam.  In  the  plu- 
ral it  becomes,  not  puelli  as  the  subject,  and  puellos 
as  the  object,  of  an  action,  but  'puellce  and  puellas^ 
those  being  feminine  inflections. 


GRAMMAR,  ENGLISH  AND  LATIN  2G1 

Loved  is  amaham,  if  you  wish  to  say,  I  loved  ;  but 
if  he  or  she  loved,  amahat ;  if  they  loved,  amahant. 
Any  of  my  readers  will  now  be  able  to  translate  this 
little  sentence :  — 

Pueri  amabant  puellam. 

There  being  no  article  in  the  Latin,  it  of  course  must 
be  supplied,  and  we  therefore  have,  — 
The  boys  loved  the  girl. 
In  this  Latin  sentence,  and  in  its  English  equiva- 
lent, the  words  not  only  represent  each  other  perfectly 
in  sense,  but  correspond  exactly  in  place.  If,  how- 
ever, we  change  the  relative  positions  of  the  English 
nouns,  without  modifying  them  in  the  least,  we  not 
only  change,  but  entirely  reverse  the  meaning  of  the 

sentence. 

The  girl  loved  the  boys. 

But  in  the  Latin  sentence  we  may  make  what  changes 
of  position  we  please,  and  we  shall  not  make  a  shade 
of  difference  in  its  meaning. 

Puellam  amabant  pueri, 
Puellam  pueri  amabant, 
Pueri  amabant  puellam, 
Pueri  puellam  amabant, 

all  have  the  same  meaning  —  the  boys  loved  the  girl. 
For  puellam  shows  by  its  form  that  it  must  be  the 
object  of  the  action  ;  amabant  must  have  for  its  sub- 
ject a  plural  substantive,  and  which  must  therefore  be, 
not  puellam,  but  pueri.  The  connections  of  the  words 
being  therefore  absolutely  determined  by  their  forms, 
their  position  in  the  sentence  is  a  matter  at  least  of 
minor  importance.  The  reader  who  has  not  learned 
Latin  will  yet,  by  referring  to  a  preceding  paragraph, 
have  little  difficulty  in  constructing  a  Latin  sentence, 
which  represents  the  reverse  of  our  first  example,  i.  e., 


262  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

the  girl  loved  the  boys.  For  in  that  the  girl  is  the 
subject,  and  the  boys  are  the  objects  of  the  action, 
and  the  verb  must  have  its  singular  form,  which  gives 

us 

Puella  amabat  pueros. 

In  the  corresponding  English  sentence,  the  words 
are  exactly  the  same  as  those  in  the  sentence  of  ex- 
actly opposite  meaning ;  in  the  Latin  they  are  all 
different.  And  again,  their  position  has  no  effect 
on  the  meaning  of  the  sentence ;  for  these  words, 
whether  given  as  above  in  the  order,  the  girl  loved 
the  boys,  or  in  the  more  elegant  order, 

Puella  pueros  amabat 
[The  girl  the  boys  loved], 

or, 

Pueros  amabat  puella 
[The  boys  loved  the  girl], 

can  have  but  one  construction,  and  therefore  but  one 
meaning,  i.  e.,  the  girl  loved  the  boys. 

If  we  extend  the  sentence  by  qualifying  either  the 
subject  or  the  object,  or  both,  the  operation  of  this 
rule  of  construction  will  be  more  striking.  Let  the 
qualification  be  goodness.  The  Latin  for  good  is 
homes  ;  but  in  this  form  the  word  qualifies  only  a  sub- 
ject of  the  singular  number  and  masculine  gender ; 
singular  feminine  and  neuter  subjects  are  qualified  as 
good  by  the  forms  hona  and  honum.  A  singular 
feminine  object  is  qualified  as  good  by  honam ;  a 
plural  masculine  subject  by  6om,  a  plural  masculine 
object  by  honos.  If,  therefore,  we  wish  to  say  that 
the  boys  were  good,  the  sentence  becomes 

Boni  pueri  amabant  puellam, 
The  good  boys  loved  the  girl. 

By  merely  changing  the  position  of  the  adjective 


GRAMMAR,  ENGLISH  AND  LATIN  263 

in  the  English  sentence,  we  say,  not  that  the  boys 
were  good,  but  the  girl : 

The  boys  loved  the  good  girL 
But  a  corresponding  arrangement  of  the  Latin  words 

Pueri  amabant  boni  puellam, 
means  still  that  the  boys  were  good,  and  the  girl  was 
loved  ;  because  honi.,  from  its  form,  can  qualify  only 
a  plural  mascidine  subject  —  here  pueri.  If  we  wish 
to  say  that  the  girl  was  good,  we  must  use  the  form  of 
bonus  which  belongs  to  a  singular  feminine  object,  and 
write  honam  puellam.  Then,  wherever  we  put  honmn^ 
it  will  qualify  only  puellam.     Thus,  in  the  sentence, 

Bonam  puellam  amabant  pueri, 
the  order  of  the  words,  represented  in  English,  is 

The  good  girl  loved  the  boys; 

but  the  meaning  is,  the  boys  loved  the  good  girl.  It 
is  not  even  necessary,  in  Latin,  that  the  adjective  and 
the  noun  which  it  qualifies  should  be  kept  together. 
Thus,  in  the  sentence, 

Puella  bonos  amabat  pueros, 
the  order  of  the  words,  represented  in  English,  is 

The  girl  good  loved  the  boys; 
and  in  this  arrangement, 

Pueros  amabat  bonos  puella, 

the  order  is. 

The  boys  loved  the  good  girl; 

but  the  meaning  in  both  is  the  same,  and  is  quite  un- 
like that  conveyed  by  the  English  arrangement  —  The 
girl  loved  the  good  boys. 

The  reason  of  this  fixed  relation  is  simply  that 
bonos,  whatever  its  place  in  this  sentence,  qualifies 
pueros  only,  as  appears  by  the  number,  gender,  and 
case  of  each,  which  are  shown  by  their  respective  and 


264  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

agreeing  forms ;  that  pueros  must  be  an  object  of 
action,  which  is  shown  by  its  form  ;  and  that  j^uella 
and  amabat  are  subject  and  predicate,  pertaining  to 
each  other,  which  is  also  shown  by  their  forms. 
Bonos  cannot  belong  to  puella,  because  the  former  is 
masculine  plural,  and  belongs  to  an  object ;  and  puella 
is  feminine  singular,  and  a  subject ;  pueros  cannot  be 
the  subject  of  amabat^  because  the  former  is  plural  in 
its  inflection,  and  the  latter  singular.  In  Juvenal's 
noble  saying,  Maxima  dehetur  puero  reverentla.  The 
greatest  reverence  is  due  to  a  boy,  the  order  of  the 
words  is  this :  greatest  is  owed  to  a  boy  reverence  ; 
and  there  is  nothing  in  this  order  to  preclude  the  appli- 
cation of  the  word  meaning  greatest  to  the  word  mean- 
ing boy,  which  would  give  us,  Reverence  is  due  to  the 
biggest  boy.  But  in  Juvenal's  sentence,  the  Latin 
word  for  boy  has  the  dative  inflection,  which  shows 
that  the  boy  is  the  recipient  of  something,  and  is  the 
object  of  the  verb  dehetur  ;  it  is  also  masculine,  and 
as  maxima  agrees  in  case  and  in  gender  with  rerie- 
rentia,  the  feminine  subject  of  the  verb,  it  must  qualify 
that  word. 

If  we  should  find  the  following  collocation  of  words, 
"  For  thy  now  sake  of  my  of  mistress  with  weeping 
swollen  redden  pretty  eyes,"  we  should  pronounce  it 
nonsense.  It  is  not  even  a  sentence.  And  yet  it  is 
a  translation  of  the  beautiful  lines,  in  the  order  of  their 
words,  with  which  Catullus  closes  his  charming  ode» 
*'  Funus  Passeris." 

"  Tua  nunc  opera  mese  puellfe 
Flendo  turgiduli  rubent  ocelli." 

And  the  words,  reduced  to  their  logical  or  English 
order,  are.  For  thy  sake  the  pretty  swollen  eyes  of  my 
mistress  now  redden  with   weeping.     The  Latin  ar* 


GRAMMAR,  ENGLISH  AND  LATIN  2G5 

rangement  is  as  if  we  were  presented  with  the  figures 
172569384,  and  were  expected  to  read  them,  not  one 
hundred  and  seventy-two  million  five  hundred  and 
sixty-nine  thousand  three  hundred  and  eighty-four, 
but  one  hundred  twenty-three  million  four  hundred 
fifty-six  thousand  seven  hundred  and  eighty-nine  ;  the 
order  12345G789  being  indicated  by  some  peculiar 
and  correspondent  form  of  the  characters  known  only 
to  the  initiated. 

Enough  has  been  said  in  illustration  of  the  differ- 
ence between  the  construction  of  the  Latin  and  that  of 
the  English  sentence.  The  former  depends  upon  the 
inflectional  forms  of  the  words  ;  and  its  sense  is  not 
affected,  or  is  affected  only  in  a  secondary  degree,  by 
their  relative  positions.  In  the  latter,  the  meaning  of 
the  sentence  is  determined  by  the  relative  positions  of 
the  words,  their  order  being  determined  by  the  con- 
nection and  interdependence  of  the  thoughts  of  which 
they  are  the  signs.  Syntax,  guided  by  etymology, 
controls  the  Latin ;  reason,  the  English.  In  brief, 
the  former  is  grammatical ;  the  latter,  logical.  Eng- 
lish admits  very  rarely,  and  only  in  a  very  slight  de- 
gree, that  severance  of  words  representing  connected 
thoughts  which  is  not  only  admissible,  but  which  is 
generally  found  in  the  Latin  sentence  ;  of  which  struc- 
tural form  the  foregoing  examples  are  of  the  simplest 
sort,  and  are  the  most  easily  resolvable  into  logical 
order. 

Milton  is  justly  regarded  as  the  English  poet  whose 
style  is  most  affected  by  Latin  models ;  and  the  open- 
ing passage  of  his  great  poem  is  often  cited  as  a 
strongly  marked  example  of  involved  construction. 
But  let  us  examine  it  briefly. 


266  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

"  Of  man's  first  disobedience  [and  the  fruit 
Of  that  forbidden  tree  whose  mortal  taste 
Brought  death  into  the  world,  aud  all  our  woe, 
With  loss  of  Eden,  till  one  greater  Man 
Restore  us,  and  regain  the  blissful  seat], 
Sing,  heavenly  muse  [that  on  the  secret  top 
Of  Oreb,  or  of  Sinai,  didst  inspire 
That  shepherd  who  first  taught  the  chosen  seed 
In  the  beginning  how  the  heavens  and  earth 
Rose  out  of  chaos]." 

This,  certainly,  is  not  the  colloquial  style,  or  even 
the  high  dramatic.  How  many  young  people,  when 
called  upon  to  "  parse  "  it,  have  sat  before  it  in  dumb 
bewilderment !  And  yet  its  apparent  intricacy  is  but 
the  result  of  a  single,  and  not  violent,  inversion.  In 
all  other  respects  the  words  succeed  each  other  merely 
as  the  thoughts  which  they  represent  arise.  The  natural 
order  of  the  passage  is,  Sing,  heavenly  muse,  of  man's 
first  disobedience ;  and  that  simple  invocation  is  the 
essential  part  of  the  sentence.  What  follows  muse^ 
between  brackets,  is  a  mere  description,  modification, 
or  limitation  of  muse  ;  what  follows  disobedience  is  a 
description  of  the  disobedience,  which  is  the  object  of 
sing  —  that  is,  the  subject  of  the  poem.  The  words 
between  brackets  are  only  a  sort  of  prolonged  paren- 
thetical adjectives,  qualifying  muse  and  disobedience. 
If  any  intelligent  person,  bearing  this  in  mind,  will 
read  the  passage,  beginning  at  sing,  and  turning  from 
chaos  back  to  the  first  line,  all  the  seeming  involution 
will  disappear ;  and  in  the  after  reading  of  it  in  its 
written  order,  he  will  be  impressed  only  by  the  gran- 
deur and  the  mighty  sweep  and  sustained  power  of 
the  invocation.  The  two  qualifying  or  adjectival  pas- 
sages, although  composed  of  several  elements,  each  of 
which  is  evolved  from  its  predecessor  which  it  quali- 
fies, being  itself  a  sort  of  adjective,  are  written  in  a 


GRAMMAR,   ENGLISH   AND  LATIN  267 

style  so  plain  and  so  direct  that  no  reader  of  ordinary 
intelligence  can  fail  to  comprehend  them  as  fully  and 
as  easily  as  he  can  comprehend  any  passage  in  a  novel 
or  newspaper  of  the  day.  Would,  indeed,  that  novels 
and  newspapers  were  written  with  any  approach  to 
such  simplicity  and  such  directness !  I  do  not  say 
such  meaning. 

Milton's  invocation  is  not  the  only  example  of  its 
kind  in  the  opening  of  a  great  English  poem.  Chaucer, 
writing  nearly  three  hundred  years  before  the  blind 
Pm-itan,  and  in  an  entirely  different  sj)irit,  thus  intro- 
duces his  "  Troilus  and  Creseide,"  a  poem  as  full  of 
imagination  and  of  a  knowledge  of  man's  inmost  heart 
as  any  one,  not  dramatic  in  form,  that  has  since  been 
bestowed  upon  the  world  :  — 

"  The  double  sorrow  of  Troilus  to  tellen, 
That  was  Kinge  Priamus  sonne  of  Troy, 
In  loving,  how  his  aventures  fellen 
From  woe  to  wele,  and  after  out  of  joy, 
My  purpose  is,  er  that  I  part  f  roy  : 
Thou,  Tesiphone,  thou  helpe  me  for  t'  indite 
These  wof  ull  verses,  that  wepen  as  I  write." 

That  is  clear  enough  to  any  intelligent  and  educated 
reader  who  is  not  troubled  by  the  fact  that  Chaucer 
*'  did  n't  know  how  to  spell ;  "  but  it  is  really  more  in- 
volved in  structure,  more  like  a  passage  from  a  Latin 
poet,  than  the  opening  of  "  Paradise  Lost."  The  sen- 
tence, according  to  the  natural  order  of  thought,  be- 
gins with  the  fifth  line,  "  My  purpose  is,"  etc.,  and 
then  turns  back  to  the  first  line,  which  itself  contains 
an  inversion  —  "  The  sorrow  to  tellen  "  for  "  To 
tellen  the  sorrow."  But  the  whole  of  the  second  line 
is  really  an  adjective  qualifying  Troilus^  and  this  is 
thrown  in  between  the  verb  "  to  tellen  "  and  the  phrase 
"  in  loving,"  the  latter  of  which  is  really  an  adjective 


268  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

qualifying  the  object  of  the  action  "  sorrow."  So  that 
the  logical  order  of  the  sentence  is  this :  "  My  pur- 
pose is  to  tell  the  double  sorrow  in  loving  of  Troilus, 
that  was  King  Priam's  son  of  Troy,  how  his  adven- 
tures fell  from  woe  to  weal,  and  after  out  of  joy." 
The  construction  of  the  passage,  however,  as  Chaucer 
wrote  it,  is  not  English  ;  and  although  in  a  formal 
opening  of  a  long  poem,  it  is  not  only  admissible,  but 
impressive,  it  would,  if  continued,  become  intolerable. 
Inversion  has  been  used  with  fine  effect  in  a  single 
clause  by  Parsons,  in  his  noble  lines  upon  a  bust  of 
Dante,  — 

"  How  stern  of  lineament,  how  grim, 
The  father  was  of  Tuscan  song  !  " 

Here  the  limiting  adjectival  phrase,  "  of  Tuscan 
song,"  is  separated  by  the  verb  from  the  noun  which 
it  qualifies,  and  the  result  is  (we  can  hardly  tell  why) 
a  deep  and  strong  impression  upon  the  reader's  mind. 
Such  effects,  however,  are  not  in  harmony  with  the 
genius  of  the  English  language,  and  are  admissible 
and  attainable  only  at  the  hands  of  those  who  wield 
language  with  a  singular  felicit3\ 

The  reason  why  inversions  of  the  logical  order  of 
thought  are  perilous,  and  rarely  admissible  in  English, 
has  a  direct  relation  to  the  subject  under  discussion. 
For  example,  in  neither  of  these  passages  from  Chaucer 
and  from  Parsons  is  the  construction  safely  keyed  to- 
gether by  etymological  forms,  as  would  have  been  the 
case  if  they  had  been  written  by  a  Greek  or  a  Latin 
poet.  We  have  to  divine  the  connection  of  the  words 
and  clauses  —  to  guess  at  it,  from  our  general  know- 
ledge of  the  poet's  meaning  —  from  the  drift  of  his 
sentence  ;  and  thus,  instead  of  being  placed  at  once  in 
communication  with  him,  and  receiving  his  thought 


GRAMMAR,  ENGLISH   AND   LATIN  269 

directly  and  without  a  doubt,  and  being  free  to  assent 
or  dissent,  to  like  or  to  dislike,  we  must  give  ourselves, 
for  a  longer  or  a  shorter  time,  —  in  some  cases  but  an 
inappreciable  moment,  —  to  unravelling  his  construc- 
tion; doing,  in  a  measure,  what  we  are  obliged  to  do 
in  reading  a  Greek  or  a  Latin  author.  In  the  exam- 
ple quoted  from  Parsons,  the  inversion,  although  vio- 
lent, disturbs  so  little  of  the  sentence,  and  produces 
so  pleasant  a  surprise,  and  one  which  is  renewed  at 
each  re-reading,  that  we  not  only  pardon,  but  ad- 
mire. Success  is  here,  as  ever,  full  justification.  But 
Chaucer  loses  more  in  clearness  and  ease  than  he 
gains  in  impressiveness  and  dignity ;  and  Milton's 
exhibition  of  power  to  mount  and  soar  at  the  first 
essay  does  not  quite  recompense  all  of  us  for  the  sud- 
den strain  he  gives  our  eyes  in  following  him.  But 
the  completest  victory  over  the  difficulty  of  inversion 
in  the  construction  of  the  English  sentence  will  not 
make  it  endurable,  except  as  a  curious  exhibition  of 
our  mother  tongue,  disguised  in  foreign  garb,  and 
aping  foreign  manners.  A  single  stanza,  composed 
of  lines  like  that  of  Parsons  on  Dante's  bust,  would 
weary  and  offend  even  the  most  cultivated  English 
reader.  Those  who  are  untrained  in  intellectual  gym- 
nastics would  abandon  it,  upon  the  first  attempt,  as 
beyond  their  powers. 

The  most  striking  example  of  the  destruction  of 
meaning  by  the  inverted  arrangement  of  thought  that 
I  have  met  with  in  the  writings  of  authors  of  repute 
is  the  following  line,  which  closes  the  beautiful  son- 
net in  Sidney's  "  Astrophel  and  Stella,"  beginning, 
"  With  how  sad  steps,  O  Moon,  thou  climbst  the 
night!"  — 

"  Do  they  call  virtue  there  forg'etfulness  ?  " 


270  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

The  meaning  of  this  seems  clear  ;  and  it  is  so, 
according  to  the  order  of  the  words,  which  ask  if,  in 
a  certain  place,  virtue  is  called  forgetfulness.  But 
this  is  exactly  the  reverse  of  Sidney's  meaning,  as 
will  be  seen  by  the  context :  — 

"  Is  constant  love  deemed  there  but  want  of  wit  ? 
Are  beauties  there  as  proud  as  here  they  be  ? 
Do  they  above  love  to  be  loved,  and  yet 
Those  lovers  scorn  whom  that  love  doth  possess  ? 
Do  they  call  virtue  there  forgetfulness  ?  " 

That  is,  we  at  last  discover.  Do  they  call  forgetful- 
ness virtue  ?  But  reason  ourselves  into  this  apprehen- 
sion of  the  sentence  as  absolutely  as  we  can,  familiar- 
ize ourselves  with  it  as  much  as  we  may,  it  will,  at 
every  new  reading,  strike  us,  as  it  did  at  first,  that 
the  poet's  question  is  asked  about  virtue.  So  abso^ 
lute,  in  English,  is  the  law  of  logical  order. 

The  following  passages,  which  I  have  recently  seen 
given  as  examples  of  confusion  resulting  from  a  lack  of 
proper  punctuation,  illustrate  the  present  subject :  — 

"  I  continued  on  using  it,  and  by  the  time  I  had  taken  five  bot- 
tles I  found  myself  completely  cured,  after  having  been  brought 
so  near  to  the  gates  of  death  by  your  infallible  medicine  !  " 

"The  extensive  view  presented  from  the  fourth  story  of  the 
Hudson  River  !  " 

"  His  remains  were  committed  to  that  bourn  whence  no  trav- 
eller returns  attended  by  his  friends." 

The  fault  here  is  not  in  the  punctuation,  but  in  the 
order  of  the  words,  which,  however,  although  nonsen- 
sical in  English,  might  make  very  good  sense  in  Greek 
or  Latin.  The  sentences  are  all  examples  of  the  hope- 
less confusion  which  may  be  produced  by  an  inver- 
sion which  violates  logical  order ;  and  if  they  were 


GRAMMAR,   ENGLISH   AND  LATIN  27k 

peppered  with  points,  the  fault  would  not  thus  be 
remedied.  I  shall  leave  it  to  my  readers  to  put  the 
words  into  their  proper  order,  merely  remarking  upon 
the  last  example,  that  the  form  of  the  sentence  is 
quite  worthy  of  a  man  who  could  speak  of  committing 
a  body  to  a  boia'ji,  and  that  bourn  the  one  whence  no 
traveller  returns  ! 

The  difference  between  the  construction  of  the  Latin 
and  Greek  languages  and  that  of  the  English  lan- 
guage is  not  accidental,  nor  the  product  of  a  merely 
unconscious  exercise  of  power.  It  is  the  result  of  a 
direct  exertion  of  the  human  will  to  make  the  instru- 
ment of  its  expression  more  and  more  simple  and 
convenient.  The  change  which  has  produced  this 
difference  began  a  very  long  while  ago,  and  for  many 
centiu'ies  has  been  making  more  or  less  progress 
among  all  the  Indo-European  languages.  Latin  is  a 
less  grammatical  language  than  its  elder  sister,  the 
Greek ;  the  modern  Latin  or  Romance  tongues,  Ital- 
ian, Spanish,  French,  are  less  grammatical  than  the 
Latin ;  the  Teutonic  tongues  are  less  grammatical 
than  the  Romance  ;  and  of  the  Teutonic  tongues  Eng- 
lish is  the  least  grammatical  —  so  little  dependent  is 
it,  indeed,  upon  the  forms  of  grammar  for  the  struc- 
ture of  the  sentence,  that  it  cannot  rightly  be  said  to 
have  any  grammar. 

And  here  I  will  remark  that  it  is  in  this  wide  dif- 
ference between  the  etymology  and  the  syntax  of  the 
modern  languages  —  French,  Italian,  Spanish,  Ger- 
man, and  English,  and  those  of  the  Greek  and  Latin  — 
that  the  incomparable  superiority  of  the  latter  as  the 
means  of  education  consists.  The  languages  of  mod- 
ern Europe,  widely  dissimilar  although  they  seem  to 
the  superficial  reader,  differ  chiefly  in  their  vocabu- 


272  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

laries  ;  and  even  there  much  of  their  unlikeness  is  due 
to  the  difference  of  pronunciation,  an  incidental  vari- 
ation which  obtains  to  a  considerable  degree  in  the 
same  language  within  the  period  of  one  hundred 
years.  In  structure  the  modern  languages  are  too 
much  alike  to  make  the  study  of  any  one  of  them 
by  a  person  to  whom  any  other  is  vernacular  very  val- 
uable as  a  means  of  mental  discipline.  They  are  ac- 
quired with  great  facility  by  people  of  no  education 
and  very  inferior  mental  powers  :  couriers  and  valets- 
de-place^  who  speak  and  write  three  or  four  of  them 
fluently  and  correctly,  being  numerous  in  all  the  capi- 
tals of  the  European  Continent. 

Education  is  not  the  getting  of  knowledge,  but 
discipline,  development ;  and  it  is  not  for  the  know- 
ledge we  obtain  at  school  and  college  that  we  pass  our 
early  years  in  study.  The  mere  acquaintance  with 
facts  that  we  then  painfully  acquire,  we  could,  in  our 
maturer  years,  obtain  in  a  tenth  j)art  of  the  time  that 
we  give  to  our  education.  Nor  is  it  necessary  in 
modei'n  days  that  any  one  should  go  for  knowledge 
to  Greek  and  Latin  authors.  All  the  lore  and  the 
thought  of  the  past  is  easily  attainable  in  a  living 
tongue.  And  finally,  to  the  demand  why,  if  boys 
must  study  language  as  a  means  of  education,  can 
they  not  study  French  or  German  languages  which 
are  now  spoken,  and  which  will  be  of  some  practical 
(i.  e.,  money-getting)  use  to  them,  the  answer  is,  that 
the  value  of  the  classical  tongues  as  means  of  educa- 
tion is  in  the  very  fact  that  they  are  dead,  and  that 
their  structure  is  so  remote  from  that  of  ours,  that  to 
dismember  their  sentences  and  reconstruct  them  ac- 
cording to  our  own  fashion  of  speaking  is  such  an 
exercise  of  perception,  judgment,  and  memory,  such  a 


GRAMMAR,   ENGLISH   AND   LATIN  273 

training  in  thought  and  in  the  use  of  language  as 
can  be  found  in  no  other  study  or  intellectual  exertion 
to  which  iunuature  and  untrained  persons  of  ordinary- 
powers  are  competent.  To  us  of  English  race  and 
speech  this  discipline  is  more  severe,  and  therefore 
more  valuable,  than  to  any  j^eople  of  the  Continent, 
because  of  the  greater  distance,  in  this  respect,  be- 
tween our  own  language  than  between  any  one  of 
theirs  and  the  Greek  and  Latin,  and  the  wider  differ- 
ence between  the  English  and  the  Greek  or  the  Latin 
cast  of  thought.  Because,  to  repeat  what  has  already 
been  insisted  upon,  the  Greek  and  the  Latin  lan- 
guages are  constructed  upon  syntactical  principles, 
which,  in  their  turn,  rest  upon  etymological  or  formal 
inflection,  and  English,  being  almost  without  formal 
inflection,  and  nearly  independent  of  syntax — with- 
out distinction  of  mood  in  verbs,  and  with  almost  none 
of  tense  and  person  —  with  only  one  case  of  nouns, 
and  with  neither  number  nor  case  in  adjectives  — 
with  no  gender  at  all  of  nouns,  of  adjectives,  or  of 
participles  —  without  laws  of  agreement  or  of  gov- 
ernment, the  very  verb  in  English  being,  in  most 
cases,  independent  of  its  nominative  as  to  form,  rests 
solely  upon  the  relations  of  thought ;  in  brief,  because 
the  Greek  and  Latin  languages  have  grammar  —  for- 
mal grammar  —  and  the  English  language,  to  all  in- 
tents and  purposes,  has  none. 

How  this  is,  and  why,  will  be  more  fully  and  partic- 
ularly considered  in  the  next  chapter. 


CHAPTER  X 

THE   GRAMMARLESS  TONGUE 

In  the  last  chapter  it  was  set  forth  that  English  is 
an  almost  grammarless  language.  The  two  elements 
of  grammar  being  etymology,  —  which  concerns  the 
inflections  of  words  ;  that  is,  changes  in  form  to  ex- 
press modification  of  meaning,  —  and  syntax,  —  which 
concerns  the  construction  of  sentences  according  to 
the  formal  relations  of  words,  —  and  the  English  lan- 
guage being  almost  without  the  former,  and  there- 
fore equally  without  the  latter,  its  use  must  be,  in  a 
corresponding  degree,  untrammelled  by  the  rules  of 
grammar,  and  subject  only  to  the  laws  of  reason, 
which  we  call  logic.  We  have,  indeed,  been  long  af- 
flicted with  grammarians  from  whom  we  have  suffered 
much,  and  to  whose  usurped  authority  we  —  that  is, 
the  most  of  us  —  have  submitted,  with  hardly  a  mur- 
mur or  a  question.  But  the  truth  of  this  matter  is, 
that  of  the  rules  given  in  the  books  called  English 
Grammars,  some  are  absurd,  and  the  most  are  super- 
fluous. For  example,  it  can  be  easily  shown  that  in 
the  English  language,  with  few  exceptions,  the  follow- 
ing simple  and  informal  relations  of  words  prevail :  — 

The  verb  needs  not,  and  generally  does  not,  agree 
with  its  nominative  case  in  number  and  person : 

Pronouns  do  not  agree  with  their  antecedent  nouns 
in  person,  number,  and  gender  : 


THE   GRAMMARLESS   TONGUE  275 

Active  verbs  do  not  govern  the  objective  case,  or 
any  other : 

Prepositions  do  not  govern  the  objective  case,  or 
any  other : 

One  verb  does  not  govern  another  in  the  infinitive 
mood : 

Nor  is  the  infinitive  a  mood,  nor  is  it  governed  by 
substantive,  adjective,  or  participle  : 

Conjunctions  need  not  connect  the  same  moods  and 
tenses  of  verbs. 

The  grammarians  have  laid  down  laws  directly  to 
the  contrary  of  these  assertions  ;  but  the  grammarians 
are  wrong,  and,  in  the  very  nature  of  things,  cannot 
be  right;  for  their  laws  assume  as  conditions  pre- 
cedent the  existence  of  things  which  do  not  exist.  In 
English,  the  verb  is  almost  without  distinction  of 
number  and  of  person ;  the  noun  is  entirely  without 
gender,  and  has  no  objective  case ;  the  adjective  and 
the  participle  are  without  number,  gender,  and  case ; 
the  infinitive  is  not  a  mood,  it  is  not  an  inflection  of 
the  verb,  or  a  part  of  it ;  and  conjunctions  are  free 
from  all  rules  but  those  of  common  sense  and  taste. 

No  term  was  ever  more  unwisely  chosen  than  gov- 
ernment to  express  the  relations  of  words  in  the  sen- 
tence. It  is  one  of  the  mysterious  metaphors  which 
have  been  imposed  upon  the  world,  generally  by  ty- 
rants or  tricksters,  and  with  which  thought  is  confused 
and  language  darkened.  In  grammar  it  implies,  or 
seems  to  imply,  a  power  in  one  word  over  another. 
Now,  there  is  in  no  language  any  such  power,  or 
any  relation  which  is  properly  symbolized  by  such  a 
power. 

In  Latin,  Greek,  and  other  inflected  languages  the 
forms  of  the  words  of  which  a  sentence  is  made  up 


276  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

present  outward  signs  of  i*equirement  which  give 
some  hint  as  to  what  the  grammarians  mean  by  one 
word's  governing  another.  But  in  English  there  is  no 
such  visible  sign ;  and  this  arbitrary,  mysterious,  and 
metaphorical  phrase,  government,  is,  to  young  minds, 
and  particularly  if  they  are  reasoning  and  not  merely 
receptive,  perplexing  in  the  extreme.  Even  in  lan- 
guages which  have  variety  of  inflection,  words  do 
not  govern  each  other  ;  but  they  may  be  said  to  fit 
into  each  other  by  corresponding  forms  which  indi- 
cate their  proper  connection,  so  that  a  sentence  is 
dovetailed  together.  In  English,  however,  with  the 
exception  of  a  few  pronouns,  one  case  of  nouns,  and 
two  tenses  and  one  person  of  the  verb,  all  the  words 
are  as  round  and  smooth,  and  as  independent  of  each 
other  in  form,  as  the  pebbles  on  the  seashore.  The 
attempt  to  bind  such  words  together  by  the  links 
of  etymology  and  syntax,  —  or,  in  other  words,  to 
make  grammatical  rules  for  a  language  in  which  the 
noun  has  only  one  case,  in  which  there  is  no  gender 
of  noun,  adjective,  or  participle,  in  which  distinction 
of  tense,  number,  person  in  verbs  is  almost  unknown, 
and  that  of  voice  absolutely  wanting,  —  is,  on  its  face, 
absurd. 

In  English,  words  are  formed  into  sentences  by  the 
operation  of  an  invisible  power,  which  is  like  magnet- 
ism. Each  one  is  charged  with  a  meaning  which 
gives  it  a  tendency  toward  some  of  those  in  the  sen- 
tence, and  particularly  to  one,  and  which  repels  it 
from  the  others ;  and  he  who  subtly  divines  and  dex- 
terously uses  this  attraction,  filling  his  words  with  a 
living  but  latent  light  and  heat,  which  makes  them 
leap  to  each  other  and  cling  together  while  they  trans- 
mit  his  freely  flowing  thought,  is   a  master  of  the 


THE  GRAMMABLESS  TONGUE  277 

English  language,  although  he  may  be  ignorant  and 
uniustructed  in  its  use.  And  here  is  one  difference 
between  the  English  and  the  ancient  classic  tongues. 
The  great  writers  of  the  latter  were,  and,  it  would 
seem,  must  needs  have  been,  men  of  high  culture  — 
grammarians  in  the  ancient  sense  of  the  word,  which 
I  have  before  mentioned  ;  but  some  of  the  best  Eng- 
lish that  has  been  written  is  the  simple,  strong  utter- 
ance of  uneducated  men,  entirely  undisciplined  in  the 
use  of  language.  True,  they  had  genius,  —  some  of 
them,  at  least ;  but  genius,  giving  them  strength  and 
clearness  of  imagination,  or  of  reason,  could  yet  not 
have  taught  them  to  write  with  purity  and  power  a 
language  like  the  Greek,  in  which  the  verb  has  three 
voices,  five  moods,  and  two  aorists,  and  nine  persons 
for  every  tense ;  in  which  all  nouns  have  three  num- 
bers, and  each  noun  a  gender  of  its  own ;  and  every 
adjective  and  participle  three  genders  and  six  cases,  a 
copiousness  of  inflection  possessed  by  the  very  arti- 
cles, definite  and  indefinite.  The  Greek  language 
may  be  the  noblest  and  most  perfect  instrument  ever 
invented  by  man  for  the  expi'ession  of  his  thought ; 
but  certainly,  of  all  the  tongues  ever  spoken  by  civi- 
lized men,  it  is  the  most  complicated.  And  I  ven- 
ture to  express  my  belief,  that  its  complication,  so  far 
from  being  an  element  of  its  power,  is  a  sign  of  rude- 
ness, and  a  remnant  of  barbarism  ;  that  the  Greek  and 
Latin  authors  were  great,  not  by  reason  of  the  verbal 
forms  and  the  grammatical  structure  of  their  lan- 
guages, but  in  spite  of  them ;  and  that  our  mother 
tongue,  in  freeing  herself  from  these,  has  only  cast 
aside  the  trammels  of  strength  and  the  disguises  of 
beauty. 

But  I  must  turn  from  these  general  considerations 


278  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

of  my  subject  to  such  an  examination  of  its  particu« 
lars  as  will  sustain  the  position  which  I  have  taken. 
And  first  of  the  verb.  The  Greek  verb  has,  for  the 
expression  of  the  various  moods  and  times  of  acting 
and  suffering  by  various  persons,  more  than  five  hun- 
dred inflections  ;  and  these  inflections  so  modify,  by 
processes  called  augmentation  and  reduplication,  and 
by  signs  of  person  and  of  number,  both  the  begin- 
ning and  the  end  of  the  verb,  that,  to  the  uninstructed 
eye,  it  passes  beyond  recognition.  Thus,  for  instance, 
TUTTTO)  (twpto)^  (the  verb  which  occupies  in  Greek 
Grammars  the  place  of  to  love  in  English  Grammars), 
assumes,  among  its  changes,  these  dissimilar  forms : 
TVTTTia  (tupto^,  I  strike ;  iT^-nxjiuv  (^etetuphein),  I  had 
struck ;  rvTrreTwa-av  (tuptetosati)  let  them  strike ;  er€Tv- 
<f)€L(rav  (^etetupheisan} ^thej  had  struck;  rvi/^as  (tupsas)^ 
having  struck;  irv-n-TOfjieOov  (^etuptornethon),  we  two 
were  struck ;  hvxl/dfxSov  (etupsamethori)^  we  two  struck 
ourselves  ;  TVfjid-qa-oi^rjv  (tuphtheesoimeeii),  I  might  be 
about  to  be  struck.  These  are  but  specimens  of  the 
more  than  five  hundred  bricks  which  go  to  make  up 
the  regular  Greek  verbal  edifice.  Each  person  of 
each  case  has  its  peculiar  significant  form  or  inflection, 
every  one  of  which  must  be  learned  by  heart. 

Looking  back  upon  this  single  and  simplest  speci- 
men of  its  myriad  inflections,  I  cannot  wonder  that 
boys  of  English  race  regard  Greek  as  an  invention  of 
the  enemy  of  mankind.  But  this  variety  of  inflection 
has  not  entirely  passed  away  with  the  life  of  the  ancient 
Hellenic  people  and  language.  It  has  been  shown  that 
the  French  language  has  three  hundred  different  termi- 
nations for  the  simple  cases  of  the  ten  regular  conju- 
gations, one  thousand  seven  hundred  and  fifty-five  for 
the  thirty -nine  irregular  conjugations,  and  two  hun* 


THE  GRAMMARLESS  TONGUE  279 

dred  for  the  auxiliary  verbs  —  making  a  sum  total  of 
two  thousand  one  hundred  and  sixty-five  terminations 
which  must  be  learned  by  heart. ^  The  verbs  of  the 
Greek  language  must  have,  I  think,  in  all,  more  than 
ten  times  that  number  of  changes  in  form.  Now, 
the  English  verb  has,  in  its  regular  or  weak  form, 
only  four  inflections ;  and  in  its  so-called  irregular,  or 
strong,  or  ancient  form,  only  five.  These  inflections 
serve  for  the  two  voices,  five  moods,  six  tenses,  and 
six  persons  which  must  have  expression  in  a  language 
that  answers  the  needs  of  a  civilized,  cultured  people. 
The  four  forms  of  the  verb  to  love,  for  instance,  are 
love.,  loves,  loved,  and  loving.  The  first  two  and  the 
last  express  action  indefinite  as  to  time,  the  third, 
definite  action.  Two  others,  lovest  and  lovedest,  are  to 
be  found  in  the  Grammars,  but  they  have  been  thrown 
out  of  use  by  the  same  process  of  simplification  which 
has  cast  off  the  mass  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  inflections 
during  the  transformation  of  that  language  into  Eng- 
lish. The  present  tense  indicative  of  the  verb  to  love, 
is,  therefore,  now  as  follows :  — 


I  love, 

We  love, 

You  love, 

You  love, 

He  loves, 

They  love. 

Here  are  five,  and,  in  effect,  six  nominatives  of  two 
numbers  and  three  persons,  but  only  two  forms  of  the 
verb.  How,  then,  to  return  to  our  rules  of  grammar, 
can  the  verb  agree  with  its  nominative  in  number  and 
person  ?  The  truth  is,  that  it  does  not  so  agree,  be- 
cause those  who  use  it  have  found  that  such  agreement 
is  not  necessary  to  the  clear  expression  of  thought. 
r  love  and  v:e  love  are  just  as  exact  in  meaning  as 
^  Sinibaldo,  quoted  by  Max  Miiller. 


280  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

amo,  amamus.     The  past  tense  of  the  English  verb 
has  not  even  one  inflection.     It  is  as  follows :  — 


I  loved, 

We  loved, 

You  loved, 

You  loved, 

He  loved. 

They  loved, 

It  was  not  always  thus.  The  Anglo-Saxon  verb, 
although,  like  the  English,  it  had  but  one  voice  and 
two  tenses,  had  inflection  of  person  and  number.  The 
present,  or  indefinite,  and  the  perfect  tenses  of  lufian^ 
to  love,  were  as  follows  :  — 


PRESENT. 

ic  lufige, 
thu  lufast, 
he  luf  ath, 

PERFECT. 

we  lufiath, 
ge  lufiath, 
hi  lufiath. 

ic  lufode, 
thu  lufodest, 
he  lufode. 

we  lufodon, 
ge  lufodon, 
hi lufodon. 

These  inflections  appear  in  what  is  called  the  Early 
English  stage  of  our  language,  and  some  of  them  are 
found  even  in  the  writings  of  Chaucer  and  Gower, 
although  in  the  days  of  those  poets  they  had  lost  their 
old  force,  and  were  rapidly  passing  away.  They  were 
dropped  almost  with  the  purpose  of  simplifying  the 
language,  of  doing  away  with  complications  which 
were  found  needless.  It  was  seen  that  as  the  noun  or 
pronoun  always  accompanied  the  verb,  the  plural  form 
in  ath  or  en  was  not  necessary  for  the  exact  expression 
of  thought,  and  that  we  love  and  we  loved  were  as  un- 
mistakable in  their  significance  as  we  lufiath  and  we 
lufodon  ;  and  so  as  to  the  other  numbers  and  persons 
of  the  two  tenses.  The  plural  form  in  en  held  a  place 
long  after  other  inflections  had  disappeared ;  but  that 


THE  GRAMMARLESS  TONGUE  281 

disappeared  from  the  written  language  about  the  end 
of  the  fifteenth  century,  and  at  last  from  the  speech 
of  the  common  people. 

The  inflections  of  the  singular  number  had  a  stronger 
hold  upon  the  language,  probably  because  the  singu- 
lar number  is  more  frequently  used  in  the  common  in- 
tercourse of  life  than  the  plural,  and  because  it  is  found 
more  necessary  to  distinguish  between  the  actions, 
thoughts,  and  conditions  of  individuals  than  between 
those  of  masses  or  groups.  The  distinctive  inflection 
of  the  second  person  singular,  est,  held  its  own  until 
the  Elizabethan  period,  when  it  began  to  disappear. 
It  prevails  in  the  English  Bible,  but  is  less  common  in 
Shakespeare  and  the  general  literature  of  the  period ; 
one  reason  being  that  precision  of  language  is  re- 
garded as  becoming  solemnity  of  occasion  or  of  sub- 
ject ;  another  being  the  increasing  use  of  the  second 
person  plural  for  both  the  singular  and  plural,  which 
is  now  j)revalent,  not  only  in  English,  but  in  most 
European  languages. 

Again,  the  change  from  tliou  lovest  and  thou 
lovedest  to  you  love  and  you  loved  seems  to  have 
been  made  merely  from  the  wish  to  do  away  with  a 
superfluous  inflection.  If,  in  the  course  of  years,  the 
inflection  of  the  third  person  singular  should  follow 
that  of  the  second,  and  we  should  say  he  love,  the 
change  would  be  directly  in  the  line  of  the  natural 
movement  of  our  language.  Should  it  not  take  place, 
the  preservation  of  this  lonely,  unsu])ported  inflection 
will  probably  be  owing  to  the  restraints  of  criticism, 
and  the  introduction  of  consciousness  and  culture 
among  the  mass  of  speakers.  To  some  of  my  readers 
it  may  seem  impossible  that  this  change  should  be 
made,  and  that  he  love  would  be  barbarous  and  almost 


282  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

incomprehensible.  But  such  is  not  the  effect  of  iden- 
tity of  form  between  the  third  person  and  the  first  of 
the  perfect  tense ;  and  as  it  is  neither  absurd  nor  ob- 
scure to  say  /  loved,  you  [i.  e.,  thou]  loved,  he  loved, 
why  should  it  be  so  to  say  /  love,  you  [i.  e.,  thou]  love, 
he  love  f 

To  turn  now  to  the  first  rule  of  our  text-books  of 
English  grammar — "A  verb  must  agree  with  its 
nominative  case  in  number  and  person."  In  this  rule, 
if  agree  means  anything,  it  can  only  mean  that  the 
verb  must  conform  itself  in  some  manner  to  its  sub- 
ject, so  that  it  may  be  seen  that  it  belongs  to  that 
subject.  This  is  the  case  in  Latin,  for  instance,  in 
which  language  every  person  of  each  number  of  the 
verb  has  a  form  which  indicates  that  person. 

[ego]  amo,  I  love,  [nos]  amamus,  we  love, 

[tu]  amas,  you  [i.  e.,  thou]  love,       [vos]  amatis,  you  love, 
[ille]  amat,  he  loves,  [il^i]  amant,  they  love. 

But  in  English,  for  five  of  these  six  persons  the  verb 
has  but  one  form.  It  has  been  released  from  all  con- 
formity to  person  except  in  the  third  person  singular. 
It  has  but  one  form  for  all  the  other  persons,  and  it 
therefore  cannot  agree  with  its  nominative  in  number 
and  person,  except  in  the  ease  specified.  To  say  that 
this  one  form  of  the  verb  does  agree  with  all  those 
forms  of  the  nominative  —  that  love  does  agree  with  /, 
and  you,  singular,  we,  you,  and  they,  plural,  is  a  mere 
begging  of  the  question  by  a  childish  and  strenuous 
"  making  believe."  And,  indeed,  as  I  trust  most  of 
my  readers  now  begin  to  see,  nearly  all  of  our  so-called 
English  grammar  is  mere  make-believe  grammar.  No 
more  words  should  be  necessary  to  show  that  verbs 
which  have  not  number  and  person  cannot  agree  with 
nominatives,  or  with  anything  else,  in  number  and 


THE  GRAMMARLESS  TONGUE  283 

person.  And  yet  that  they  do  so  agree  is  dinned  into 
children  from  their  infancy  until  they  cease  to  receive 
instruction;  and  they  are  required  to  cite  a  rule  wliich 
they  cannot  understand,  as  the  law  of  a  relation  which 
does  not  exist. 

The  Anglo-Saxon  language  was  even  charier  as  to 
tenses  of  the  verb  than  as  to  numbers  and  persons. 
It  had  but  two  of  the  former,  the  present,  or  rather 
the  indefinite,  and  the  past.  As  it  passed  into  English, 
this  number  was  not  increased.  No  English  verb  has 
more  than  two  tenses.  With  these  and  the  two  par- 
ticiples, present  and  past,  English  speaking  folk  ex- 
press all  the  varieties  of  mood  and  tense,  and  also 
of  voice ;  for  in  English  there  is  but  one  voice,  the 
active.  The  Anglo-Saxon  present  or  indefinite  tense 
expressed  future  action  as  well  as  present.  Ic  hifige. 
(I  love)  predicated  loving  in  the  future  as  well  as  in 
the  present  time.  Nor  has  this  form  of  speech  passed 
away  from  the  Anglo-Saxon  folk.  To  this  day  we 
say,  I  go  to  town  to-morrow ;  Do  you  go  to  town  to- 
morrow ?  The  form,  /  shall  go  to  town,  is  rarely  used 
except  for  emphasis  ;  that,  /  will  go,  except  to  ex- 
press determination.  Indeed,  /  go  is  the  more  ele- 
gant form  ;  is  heard  most  generally  from  the  lips  of 
speakers  of  the  highest  culture.  And  in  fact,  the 
commonest  predication  of  future  action  is  one  which 
expresses  action  passing  continuously  at  time  present 
—  I  am  going,  e.  g.,  I  am  going  to  town  to-morrow. 

This  use  of  the  present  or  indefinite  tense  is  not  at 
all  peculiar  to  the  Anglo-Saxon  language,  or  to  the 
English.  It  appears  in  many  others.  "  Simon  Peter 
said  unto  them,  I  go  a  fishing ;  they  say  unto  him, 
We  also  go  with  thee."  Two  Greek  verbs  arc  here 
translated  go  ;  but  both  the  first,  vTvayta  (Jiwpago^,  and 


284  WORDS  AND   THEIR   USES 

the  second,  tpxo/Ae^a  (erchometlia),  are  in  the  present 
tense.  In  this  passage,  too,  /  </o,  /  am  going ^  I  shall 
go,  and  we  go,  we  are  going,  we  will  go,  would  be 
equivalents.  The  peculiarity  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  and 
the  English  languages  in  this  respect  (if  they  are  two 
languages,  which  some  philologists  with  show  of  reason 
deny,  on  the  ground  that  our  present  speech  is  only 
a  lineal  descendant  of  that  of  our  forefathers),  —  the 
peculiarity  of  our  tongue  as  to  this  tense  and  others 
is,  that  while,  like  others,  it  uses  the  present  indefinite 
form  to  express  future  action,  it  has  not  developed  a 
form  of  the  verb  for  the  special  expression  of  that 
action,  or,  in  fact,  of  any  other  action  but  that  which 
is  either  present  or  past.  We  say,  /  shall  go  ;  but 
shall  can  no  more  be  a  part  of  the  verb  go  than  will, 
or  mag,  or  can.  We  say,  /  have  loved  ;  but,  again, 
have  is  no  more  a  part  of  the  verb  love  than  to  be  is, 
when  we  say.  If  I  were  loving.  When  we  say,  I  am 
loving,  we  only  say,  in  other  words,  I  exist  loving  ;  and 
what  connection  has  am  with  loving  other  than  exist 
would  have  were  it  used  in  the  place  of  the  former  ? 
We,  like  other  peoples,  are  obliged  to  express  all  the 
different  times  of  action,  present,  past,  and  future  ; 
but  most  other  peoples  do  this  by  inflections,  that  is, 
by  real  tenses  of  the  verb.  As  English  has  different 
words  for  expressing  the  time  present  and  time  past 
of  the  same  action,  other  tongues  have  different  words 
for  expressing  all  the  varieties  of  the  time  of  action. 

In  English  we  say,  I  love,  I  have  loved,  I  shall  have 
loved ;  but  in  Latin  the  same  thoughts  are  expressed 
respectively  by  the  different  single  words  amo,  amavi, 
amavero.  To  express  what  the  Roman  expressed  by 
amavi,  an  inflection  of  amo,  we  use  a  verb  have,  and 
the  perfect  participle  of  another  verb.    That  participle 


THE   GRAMMARLESS  TONGUE  285 

is  an  expression  of  completed  action  in  the  abstract  — 
loved.  It  has  no  relation  to  person,  whether  the  per- 
son is  the  subject  or  the  object  of  the  action,  —  a 
point  to  be  remembered  in  our  consideration  of  voice 
—  or  to  specific  time  or  occasion.  The  only  real  verb 
that  we  use  in  this  instance  is  one  that  signifies  pos- 
session. We  say,  I  have  —  have  what  ?  possess  what  ? 
Possession  implies  an  object  possessed  ;  and  in  this 
case  it  is  that  completed  action  which  is  expressed  in 
the  abstract  by  the  participle.  Loved  is  here  the  ob- 
ject of  the  verb  have  as  much  as  money  would  be  in 
the  sentence,  I  have  money ;  and  /  have  loved  is  no 
more  a  verb,  or  a  part  or  tense  of  a  verb,  than  / 
have  money  is,  or  I  have  to  go.  In  the  first  and  the 
last  of  these,  loved  and  to  go  are  as  plainly  objects  of 
the  verb  have  as  money  is  in  the  second ;  nor  is  this 
relation  at  all  affected  by  the  mere  verbal  origin  of  the 
jDarticiple  and  the  infinitive. 

As  to  the  latter,  what  the  grammarians  call  the  in- 
finitive mood  is  no  mood  at  all,  but  a  substantive,  of 
verbal  origin.  It  is  the  name  of  the  verb,  and  so  may 
well  be  called  a  substantive.  It  is  not  so  called  for 
that  reason,  but  because  there  is  no  quality  of  a  sub- 
stantive which  the  infinitive  has  not,  and  but  one  rela- 
tion of  the  substantive  —  that  of  possession  —  which 
it  cannot  assume ;  and  there  is  no  distinctive  quality 
of  the  verb  which  it  does  not  lack,  or  relation  of  the 
verb  which  it  can  assume.  For  instance,  /  have  to  go 
is  merely.  It  belongs  to  me  to  go.  To  go  belongs  to  me 
• —  forms  of  expression  not  uncommon  among  the  most 
cultivated  and  idiomatic  speakers,  and  which  are  not 
only  correct,  but  elegant.  But  that  which  is  exi^ressed 
by  a  verb  cannot  belong  to  any  one.  Only  a  thing, 
something  substantial  (although  not  necessarily  mate 


286  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

rial  or  physical),  i.  e.,  a  substantive,  can  belong.  This 
is  no  new  discovery ;  and  yet  grammarians  have  gone 
on  for  generations  teaching  children  and  strangers  that 
to  go  is  a  mood,  as  they  have  taught  them  that  /  have 
gone  and  I  shall  go  are  tenses  of  a  verb.^ 

The  substantive  character  of  the  infinitive  is  to  be 
discovered  in  those  phrases  which  the  grammarians 
call  the  future  tense  indicative,  and  the  present  and  im- 
perfect tenses  subjunctive  —  I  shall  love,  I  may  love, 
and  I  might  love.  These  are  no  tenses,  and  have 
no  semblance  of  tenses ;  they  are  phrases,  or  rather 
complete  sentences,  which  express  future  or  contingent 
action. 

The  formation  of  the  future  indicative  and  of  the 
tenses  of  the  subjunctive  mood  was  in  this  wise  :  The 
Anglo-Saxon  infinitive  was  formed  in  a7i  or  en,  and  did 
not  admit  the  preposition  to  before  it ;  but  there  was 
a  second  infinitive,  formed  with  the  preposition,  having 
a  dative  sense,  and  being,  in  fact,  a  dative  form  of  the 
infinitive,  conveying  that  sense  of  obligation  or  perti- 
nence to  which  linguists  have  given  the  name  dative. 
Thus  witan  is  the  Anglo-Saxon  infinitive,  meaning  to 
know ;  but  there  was  used  another  infinitive,  to  witanne, 
implying  duty,  obligation.     For  example.  Hit    is  to 

^  Mary  Elstob  alone,  among  Anglo-Saxon  grammarians  ("  The 
English-Saxon  Grammar,"  4to,  London,  1715,  p.  31),  mentions 
"  a  future  tense  or  time  to  come  "  in  that  language  ;  of  which 
her  example  is,  "  ic  standi  nu  rihte,  or  on  sumne  timan,  I  shall 
stand  by-and-by,  or  some  time  or  other  ;  "  and  a  very  pretty  sort 
of  future  tense  it  is  —  one  that  must  commend  itself  to  some  of 
my  critics,  and  all  the  gentlemen  who  "  usually  talk  of  a  noun  and 
a  verb."  For  if  /  stand  at  some  time  or  other  be  not  as  good  a 
tense  as  I  shall  have  stood,  they  may  be  able  to  tell  the  reason 
why.  1  regret  for  their  sakes  that  Mistress  Elstob  is  not,  at  the 
present  day,  a  very  high  authority  on  the  Anglo-Saxon  language. 


THE  GRAMMARLESS  TONGUE  287 

witaniie,  it  is  to  know,  i.  e.,  it  should  be  known,  or 
ought  to  ho  known.  This  veiy  phrase  (with  the  mere 
rubbing  off  of  the  termination  during  its  passage 
through  the  centuries)  has  come  down  to  us  as  to  vnt. 
But  to  hnoio  itself  has  been  thus  used  for  five  hun- 
dred years,  as  in  the  following  passage  in  Purvey's 
Prologue  to  the  revised  Wycliffe  Bible,  a.  d.  1388  :  — 

"  First  it  is  to  know  that  the  best  translating  is  to  translate 
after  the  sentence,  and  not  only  after  the  words." 

And  it  also  appears  not  infrequently  nowadays  in  the 
phrase.  You  are  to  know  —  thus  and  so,  meaning.  You 
should  know.  You  ought  to  know,  It  behooves  you  to 
know,  thus  and  so ;  and  constantly  in  the  colloquial 
phrases,  I  have  to  go  here  or  there,  I  have  to  do  thus 
and  so.  The  phrase.  This  house  to  let,  which  some 
uneasy  precisians  would  change  into  Tliis  house  to  he 
let,  is  quite  correct,  and  has  come  down  to  us,  as  it 
will  be  seen,  from  the  remotest  period. 

Now,  when  Anglo-Saxon  was  becoming  English  by 
the  dropping  of  its  few  inflections  and  the  laying  aside 
of  its  light  bonds  of  formal  grammar,  the  form  of  the 
infinitive  which  remained  was  naturally  the  one  which 
was  indicated,  not  by  an  inflection,  but  by  a  preposi- 
tion. At  first,  and  indeed  for  a  century  or  two,  the 
inflected  termination  was  retained,  but  it  would  seem 
merely  from  habit,  with  no  significance  attached  to  it. 
Thus  in  the  passage  from  Chaucer's  "  Troilus  and 
Cresseide"  quoted  in  the  last  chapter,  the  first  line 
is  — 

*'  The  double  sorrow  of  Troilus  to  tellen.'''' 

But  in  Chaucer's  day,  our  forefathers  were  beginning 
to  drop  the  n  and  the  syllable  of  which  it  was  part, 
and  instead  of  to  liven  and  to  loven,  to  ^v^•ite  to  live 


288  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

and  to  love,  as  we  do.  But  they  wrote  to  telle,  as  we 
do  not ;  the  final  e,  which  appears  in  old,  and  in  some 
modern  forms  of  certain  verbs,  being-  in  its  place,  not 
by  mere  accident,  but  as  a  remnant  of  the  old  infini- 
tive. Hence,  too,  this  final  e  was  sometimes  pro- 
nounced, as  every  student  of  Chaucer  knows.  The 
dropping  of  old  plurals  of  verbs  and  nouns  in  en  (a 
great  loss  in  the  latter  case,  I  think)  left  many  words 
ending  in  silent  e  preceded  by  a  double  consonant,  —  a 
form  which  began  to  pass  rapidly  away  in  the  latter 
part  of  the  sixteenth  century,  but  which  may  still  be 
traced  in  our  orthography ;  for  instance,  the  very  verb 
in  the  line  from  "  Troilus  and  Cresseide."  If  we  do  not 
write  tellen,  there  is  no  etymological  reason  why  we 
should  not  write  tel.  The  cause  of  the  present  form  of 
the  verb  is,  that  in  Anglo-Saxon  it  was  a  dissyllable,  and 
that  in  dropping  the  last  syllable,  only  its  essentials, 
the  vowel  and  the  following  consonant,  were  removed. 
The  double  consonant  is  now  retained  in  some  words, 
and  the  silent  vowel  in  some  others,  as  love  and  live^ 
for  orthoepical  reasons. 

To  return  to  the  formation  of  what  the  grammari- 
ans call  the  future  indicative  tense,  and  to  the  tenses 
of  the  subjunctive  mood.  These,  they  tell  us,  are 
formed  by  means  of  auxiliary  verbs.  But  that  is  a 
very  misleading  representation  of  the  case,  consequent 
upon  the  endeavor  to  keep  up  the  fiction  of  formal 
grammar  in  English  —  the  make-believe  system.  In 
fact,  the  auxiliary  theory  is  a  mere  clumsy  sham. 
In  I  am  loved,  I  will  go,  there  are  no  auxiliary  or 
really  helping  words.  Neither  word  needs  the  help  of 
the  other,  except,  as  other  words  do,  for  the  making 
of  a  sentence,  which  each  of  these  exampl'es  is,  com- 
pletely.     In  /  am  loved,  and  /  will  go,  am  and  will 


THE  GRAMMARLESS  TONGUE  289 

are  no  more  helping  vei-bs  than  exist  and  detcrjnlae 
are  in  the  sentences,  I  exist  loved,  and  1  determine  to 
go.  Loved  and  go  will  each  make  a  perfect  sense  with 
I  and  without  any  help  —  I  loved,  I  go.  In  the  sen- 
tences I  am  loved  and  I  will  go,  loved  and  go  are  not 
verbs.  The  former  is  a  participle,  or  verbal  adjective, 
the  latter  a  verbal  substantive.  The  Anglo-Saxon  had 
not  even  any  seeming  auxiliary  verbs.  Its  use  of 
hahhan^  beon,  willan,  magan,  cunnan,  and  7not  (i.  e., 
have,  be,  will,  may,  can,  might),  does  not  convey  the 
notion  of  time  and  contingency,  but  simply  predi- 
cates possession,  existence,  volition,  necessity,  power ; 
and  hence  came  those  phrases  by  which  we  speak  of 
action  or  existence  in  the  future  or  under  supposed 
circumstances.  /  ivlll  tell  is  in  old  English,  I  will 
tellen,  and  this  is  merely  the  verb  /  will  joined  to 
the  infinitive  or  verbal  substantive  tellen.  From  the 
latter  the  last  syllable  has  been  worn  ;  but  none  the 
less  I  will  tell  is  simply  I  will  to  tell.  The  dative 
pertaining  idea  is  conveyed,  i.  e.,  my  will  is  to  tell,  my 
will  is  for  telling,  or  toward  telling.  Thus  /  can  love 
is  merely  I  can  to  love,  I  am  able  to  love ;  and  so  it 
is  with  the  phrases  I  might  love,  I  could  love,  I  woxdd 
love,  I  should  love.  They  are  all,  not  verbs  or  parts 
of  verbs,  but  phrases  formed  by  the  use  of  the  indica- 
tive present  of  one  verb  with  the  infinitive  or  verbal 
substantive  of  another. 

By  this  discarding  of  inflected  tenses  the  English 
language  has  gained,  not  only  in  simplicity,  but  in 
flexibility  and  variety.  The  Latin  language,  for  in- 
stance, has,  for  the  expression  of  I  might  love,  and  also 
of  I  could,  and  of  I  would,  and  of  I  should,  love, 
only  the  single  inflected  form  cmiarem  :  whereas  we  are 
able  to  express,  in  regard  to  the  same  time  of  action, 


290  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

four  very  marked  and  differing  shades  of  meaning, 
while  we  are  entirely  freed  from  the  grammatical  re- 
straints and  complications  imposed  by  inflection.  The 
Latin  folk  were  obliged  to  remember  six  forms  for 
this  one  tense,  and  yet  were  able  to  make  no  distinc- 
tion in  tense  between  the  ideas  of  possibility,  power, 
volition,  and  obligation,  in  connection  with  future 
action. 

SINGULAR.  PLURAL. 

1.  Amarem,  1.  Amaremus, 

2.  Amares,  2.  Amaretis, 

3.  Amaret,  3.  Amarent. 

Whereas  in  English  we,  by  a  simple  change  of  the 
subject,  noun  or  pronoun,  say,  — 


I  r  might,  or 

You  could,  or 

He  J  would,  or 

We  I  should. 

You  I  (according  to  the  meaning   l 

They  L  to  be  conveyed)           J 


*  love. 


But  we  do  not  thereby  form  a  tense  of  the  verb. 
Could  absurdity  be  more  patent  than  in  the  assertion, 
not  only  that  might  and  should  are  a  part  of  the  verb 
to  love,  but  that  several  words  conveying  thoughts  so 
widely  different  as  /  might  love  and  /  should  love, 
are  actually  the  same  part  of  the  same  verb?  A  con- 
sideration of  the  difference  in  meaning  of  those  two 
sentences,  of  their  radical  difference,  or  rather  their 
absolute  opposition,  the  one  expressing  possibility,  the 
otlier  obligation,  and  of  the  fact  that,  according  to  the 
English  grammarians,  they  are  equally  parts  of  one  so- 
called  tense,  the  imperfect  subjunctive,  which  in  Latin 
is  a  tense,  amarem,  will  make  it  clear  that  in  English 
we  have  not  merely  substituted  one  tense  form  for 


THE   GRAMMARLESS   TONGUE  291 

another.  We  have  done  away  with  the  tense ;  we 
have  done  away  with  all  tenses,  except  the  present, 
or  indefinite,  and  the  past.  We  have  found  that  those 
tenses  are  all  that  we  need ;  that  with  the  forms  sig- 
nificant of  present  and  of  past  action,  or  being,  or 
suffering,  we  can  express  ourselves  in  conformity  to 
all  the  conditions  of  time,  past,  present,  and  future. 

As  we  have  dealt  with  tenses,  so  have  we  with 
voices.  The  English  verb  has  but  one  voice  —  the 
active.  And  not  only  has  it  no  passive  voice,  but  there 
is  in  the  language  no  semblance  of  a  passive  voice. 
The  Greek,  who  must  have  three  numbers  to  his  nouns, 
one  for  an  individual,  one,  the  dual,  for  two,  and  a  third 
for  more  than  two,  was  also  not  content  without  three 
voices  —  the  active,  the  passive,  and  one  which  was  in 
sense  between  those  two,  which  has  been  called  the 
middle  voice,  but  might  better  have  been  called  the 
reflective  voice.  Thus  we  say  I  wash,  I  am  washed,  I 
washed  myself ;  the  Greek,  expressing  the  same  facts 
that  are  expressed  by  these  English  phrases,  said,  in 
three  words,  AoiJoj  (louo)^  Xovofxai  (louomai)^  iXovcrajxrjv 
(je,lousameen).  .  Now,  the  English  grammarians  tell 
their  hapless  pupils  that  to  he  loashed  is  the  passive 
voice  of  the  verb  to  wash.  It  is  no  such  thing.  If 
/  am  ivashed  is  the  passive  voice  of  /  wash,  equally 
is  I  wash  myself  its  middle  voice.  But  no  English 
grammarian  known  to  me,  or  that  I  ever  heard  of,  has 
set  forth  such  forms  of  speech  as  /  loashed  myself  as 
a  middle  voice.  It  is  a  sentence,  as  much  so  as  / 
washed  John  ;  and  if  myself  is  no  part  of  the  verb 
to  wash,  no  more  is  ayn  ;  and  /  am  washed  is  no  part 
of  any  verb,  but  a  complete  sentence,  with  a  subject 
and  a  predicate  consisting  of  a  verb  and  a  participial 
adjective.     The  reason  why,  although  /  am  washed  is 


292  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES  ^ 

set  down  by  the  English  grammarians  as  a  part  of  the 
verb  to  wash,  I  wash  myself  is  not,  plainly  is  that  the 
Latin  language,  upon  which  our  English  grammarians 
have  formed  their  system,  and  to  which  their  rules 
have  been  as  much  as  jjossible  assimilated,  has  a  pas- 
sive, but  no  middle  voice.  Had  there  been  a  middle 
voice  in  the  Latin,  there  would  have  been  one  in  the 
English  Grammars,  and  we  should  have  been  told  that 
one  part  of  the  verb  to  wash  was  I  shall  have  washed 
myself,  although  we  could  separate  this  tense  thus :  I 
probably  shall  by  ten  o'clock  have  nearly  washed  or 
bathed  myself. 

We  have  done  away  with  the  passive  voice  in  all 
its  moods  and  tenses ;  and  we  have  no  passive  form 
of  the  verb  whatever,  not  even  a  passive  participle. 
We  express  the  fact  of  passivity,  or  the  recipience  of 
any  action,  by  some  verb,  and  the  perfect  participle  of 
the  vei'b  expressing  that  action ;  and  this  perfect  par- 
ticiple we  apply  to  ourselves  or  to  others  as  a  qualifi- 
cation. In  technical  language  we  make  it  a  participial 
adjective,  that  is,  a  word  which  qualifies  a  noun  by 
representing  it  as  affected  or  modified  by  some  action. 
Thus  we  say,  a  good  man,  or,  a  loved  man  ;  and  in 
these  phrases  both  good  and  loved  are  adjectives 
qualifying  man.  To  he  loved  is  no  more  a  verb  than 
to  he  good.  According  to  the  English  grammarians, 
we  can  conjugate  the  former  in  all  the  moods  and 
tenses  of  their  so-called  passive  voice.  But  so  we  can 
the  latter. 

I  am  good,  We  are  good, 

Thou  art  good.  Ye  or  you  are  good. 

He  is  good.  They  are  good. 

This  is  conjugation  as  much  as  /  am  loved,  Thou  art 
loved,  and  so  forth,  is ;  and  it  can  be  carried  out,  of 


THE   GRAMMARLESS   TONGUE  293 

course,  to  I  shall  have  been,  or  I  might,  could,  would, 
or  should  have  been  —  either  good  or  loved,  it  makes 
no  difference  which.  But  that  is  not  conjugation  in 
either  case  ;  it  is  the  mere  forming  of  sentences.  When 
a  Greek  boy  wished  to  express  his  conviction  that  at 
a  certain  time  future,  if  he  had  done  what  was  wrong, 
or  liad  not  done  what  was  right,  certain  unpleasant 
consequences  would  have  followed,  he  said,  in  one 
word,  TeTvij/ofiai  (tetivpsomai^,  which  is  a  tense  of  the 
verb  TUTTToj  {tu2)to^.  But  the  English  boy  uses  instead 
of  this  one  word  a  sentence  made  up  of  a  pronoun, 
two  verbs,  and  two  participles :  he  says,  I  shall  have 
been  beaten.  Of  the  verbs,  the  first,  shall,  expresses 
a  present  sense  of  future  certainty,  obligation,  or  inevi- 
tableness.  Thus  Dr.  Johnson  says,  /  shall  love  is 
equivalent  to  "  it  will  be  so  that  I  must  love."  The 
second  verb,  have,  expresses  possession.  He  says,  I 
shall  have  —  what  ?     Something. 

r  something. 
I  shall  have   •<  a  beating. 

(been  beaten. 

Have  cannot  have  one  meaning  in  two  of  these  in- 
stances, and  another  in  the  third.  Of  the  two  perfect 
or  definite  participles,  the  first,  heeji,  expresses  past 
existence.  He  says,  I  shall  have  been  —  what  ?  Some- 
thing, or  in  some  condition. 

/  a  bad  boy. 
I  shall  have  been  3  deficient  in  my  lesson. 
(  beaten. 

By  what  process  can,  or  in  consequence  of  what  ne- 
cessity does,  heen  have  one  meaning  in  two  of  these 
instances,  and  another  in  the  third?  But  by  the 
union  of  the  verb  of  existence  with  the  perfect  or 
definite  participle  of  an  active  verb,  the  English  lau- 


294  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

guage  can  and  does  express  the  recipience  of  action, 
i.  e.,  existence  tinder  action.  Therefore  the  perfect 
participle  of  the  verb  of  existence  united  to  that  of  an 
active  verb  expresses  the  perfected  recipience  of  ac- 
tion. But,  according  to  English  idiom,  we  cannot  use 
hee}i  without  putting  the  idea  of  possession  between 
it  and  the  subject.  To  express  a  completed  existence, 
we  say  not,  /  been,  but  /  have  been.  Therefore  our 
English  boy,  when  he  says,  I  shall  have  been  beaten, 
says  in  other  words.  It  will  be  so  that  I  must  possess 
the  perfected  recipience  of  the  action  of  beating. 
Truly,  a  long  and  lumbering  equivalent  of  his  phrase  ; 
but  so  are,  and  so  must  be,  all  explanations  and  para- 
phrases of  idiomatic  or  figurative  forms  of  speech. 
None  the  less,  however,  is  /  shall  have  been  beaten  a 
sentence  ;  and  this  sentence,  thus  made  up  of  a  pro- 
noun, with  two  verbs  and  two  participles  which  have 
no  etymological  relations,  English  grammarians  call  a 
tense,  the  future  perfect  tense  of  the  passive  voice  of 
the  verb  to  beat!  Could  there  be  better  proof  that 
the  English  verb  has  neither  future  tense  nor  passive 
voice  ?  ^ 

The  simplification  of  our  language,  which  has  left 
the  English  verb  only  one  voice  and  but  two  tenses, 
has  given  only  one  case  to  the  English  noun,  the  pos- 
sessive, or  two  if  we  reckon  the  nominative,  which, 
strictly  speaking,  is  not  a  case.     The  English  noun 

1  I  need  not  stop  to  say  to  the  candid  scholar  that  the  Latin, 
like  the  English,  is  without  a  tense  corresponding  to  the  Greek 
third  future  passive,  and  also  without  some  other  formal  tenses  in 
the  passive  voice.  But  that  is  not  to  my  present  purpose.  Here 
Latin  and  Greek  concern  me  only  when  they  can  be  used  by 
way  of  illustration.  As  to  some  objections  which  have  been 
made  to  the  theory  of  our  verb  formation,  imperfectly  set  forth 
above,  see  the  Note  at  the  end  of  this  chapter. 


THE  GRAMMARLESS  TONGUE  295 

has  no  objective  case.  English  grammarians  tell  us 
that  it  has,  and  that  this  case  is  governed,  and  agrees, 
and  is  put  in  apposition,  and  what  not.  But  tlie 
truth  is,  that  the  English  language,  although  it  ex- 
presses clearly  the  objective  relation,  does  it  without 
case,  and  merely  by  position,  arrangement  in  logical 
order.  One  of  the  rules  of  the  English  grammarians 
is  that,  "  Active  verbs  govern  the  objective  case,"  or, 
according  to  another  form,  "  A  noun  or  pronoun  used 
as  the  object  of  a  transitive  verb  or  its  participles  must 
be  in  the  objective  case  ;  as,  William  defeated  Har- 
old." Here,  therefore,  we  are  told  Harold  is  in  "the 
objective  case."  How,  then,  is  it  with  this  sentence  ? 
—  Harold  defeated  William.  No  change  has  been 
made  in  the  word  Harold  ;  it  is  in  the  same  case  in 
both  sentences.  It  has  simply  changed  its  position, 
and  so  its  relation.  In  the  former  sentence,  Harold  is 
the  object,  and  William  the  subject,  of  the  action  ;  in 
the  latter,  Harold  is  the  subject,  and  William  the  ob- 
ject. But  what  in  language  could  be  more  absurd  or 
more  confusing  to  a  learner  than  to  say  that  a  mere 
change  in  the  place  of  a  word  makes  a  change  in  its 
case  ?  And  so,  as  to  the  rule,  "  A  noun  or  pronoun 
used  to  explain  or  identify  another  noun  is  put  by 
apposition  in  the  same  case ;  as,  William,  the  Norman 
duke,  defeated  Harold,  the  Saxon  king."  Here  we  are 
told  that  duhe  is  in  the  nominative  case,  because  it  is 
in  apposition  with  William^  and  that  hing  is  in  the 
objective  case,  it  being  in  apposition  with  Harold. 
But  let  the  words  be  merely  shifted,  without  any 
inflection,  and  let  us  read,  Harold,  the  Saxon  king, 
defeated  William,  the  Norman  duke ;  which  is  Eng- 
lish, and  might  have  been  truth.  In  what  case  here 
are  l:ing  and  duke  ?     Clearly  they  are  in  no  case  in 


296  WORDS  AND   THEIR  USES 

either  example.  They  are  simply  subject  and  object, 
or  object  and  subject,  according  to  their  relative  posi- 
tions. 

We  are  told  by  one  of  the  latest  English  gramma- 
rians, in  his  etymology  of  pronouns,  that,  "  To  pro- 
nouns, like  nouns,  belong  person,  number,  gender,  and 
case."  This  is  a  notably  incorrect  assertion.  Upon 
two  of  these  points,  nouns  and  pronouns  are  remark- 
ably unlike ;  upon  one  other  they  are  correctly  said  to 
be  alike ;  upon  the  fourth,  the  assertion  is  untrue  as 
to  both. 

Pronouns  and  nouns  have  number  ;  pronouns  have 
person,  nouns  have  not ;  pronouns  have  two  cases  — 
the  possessive  and  the  objective,  nouns  but  one  —  the 
possessive.  The  rules  given  in  English  Grammars  for 
the  syntax  of  nouns,  apply,  with  a  single  exception,  to 
pronouns  only,  and  are  founded  chiefly  upon  the  per- 
sons and  cases  of  the  latter  —  the  forms  /,  my,  me, 
We,  our,  us.  Thou,  thy,  thee.  You,  your,  He,  his,  him. 
She,  hers,  her.  It,  its.  They,  their,  them,  to  which  there 
are  no  corresponding  forms  in  nouns,  except  the  pos- 
sessive in  es,  which  has  been  contracted  to  's,  as  if 
we  were  feeling  our  way  towards  its  entire  abolition. 
Disappear  it  surely  will,  if  we  find  that  we  can  do 
without  it,  and  that,  for  instance,  John  coat  is  just  as 
precise  and  apprehensible  as  Johns  coat.  One  of  the 
pronoun  cases  is  visibly  disappearing  —  the  objective 
c^i^e  whom.  Even  in  the  fastidious  "Saturday  Re- 
view "  we  sometimes  find  who  as  the  object  of  a  verb. 
Our  pronouns,  however,  are  still  inflected,  and  have 
cases ;  and  of  pronoims,  active  verbs  do  govern,  or 
rather  require,  the  objective  case.  To  our  few  pro- 
nouns, then,  may  be  applied  all  those  rules  of  con- 
struction which  rest  upon  case-form,  whiclij  borrowed 


THE   GRAMMARLESS   TONGUE  297 

from  the  Latin  language  and  thrust  upon  the  student 
of  English,  are  announced  in  our  Grammars  as  the 
laws  for  the  syntax  of  the  vast  multitude  of  nouns. 

Thus  far,  as  to  the  positive  likeness  and  unlikeness 
of  nouns  and  pronouns.  They  have  also  a  negative 
likeness,  as  to  which  they  are  misrepresented  in  all 
English  Grammars,  as  in  the  one  above  cited.  Both 
nouns  and  pronouns  are  loithoiit  gender.  There  is 
no  gender  in  the  English  language.  Distinctions  of 
sex  are  expressed  by  English  folk ;  but  this  fact  does 
not  imply  the  existence  of  gender  in  the  English  lan- 
guage. Sex  is  generally,  although  not  always,  ex- 
pressed by  gender ;  but  distinction  of  gender  rarely 
implies  distinction  of  sex.  There  ai'e  thousands  of 
words  in  Greek,  in  Latin,  and  in  French,  which  are 
masculine  or  feminine,  and  which  are  the  names  of 
things  and  of  thoughts  that  can  have  no  sex.  The 
Latin  noun  pennw,  a  pen,  is  feminine  ;  and  so  is  the 
French  tahle^  a  table.  These  words  have  gender, 
although  the  things  they  signify  have  no  sex.  The 
corresponding  English  nouns  are  said  in  English 
Grammar  to  be  of  "  the  neuter  gender."  But  they 
are  of  no  gender  at  all. 

Gender  in  language  belongs,  not  to  things,  but  to 
words.  It  is  one  of  the  most  barbarous  and  foolish 
notions  with  which  the  mind  of  man  was  ever  vexed. 
One  or  two  examples  shall  make  this  plain.  Beau  is 
the  French  adjective  expressing  masculine  beauty ;  its 
feminine  counterpart  is  helle  ;  so  that  a  fine  man  has 
come  to  be  called  a  heau.,  and  a  beautiful  woman  a 
helle.  But,  notwithstanding  this,  women,  as  the  fair 
sex,  are  called  in  French  le  heau  sexe  —  the  reason 
being  that  in  French,  sex,  the  word  sexe,  is  mascu- 
line !     All  languages  afflicted  with  gender  are  covered 


298  WORDS  AND   THEIR   USES 

with  such  irritating  absurdity  ;  so  that  this  distinction 
of  words  is  the  bane  and  the  torment  of  learners, 
whether  to  the  manner  born  or  not.  For  instance,  in 
French,  one  is  in  constant  dread  lest  one  should  com- 
mit such  blunders  as  to  speak  of  masculine  breeches — 
the  name  of  that  garment  in  France  being,  with  fine 
satire,  feminine.  And  yet,  with  all  this  complicated 
provision  of  gender  —  say  rather  by  reason  of  it — • 
these  languages  are  sometimes  unable  to  distinguish 
sex.    A  case  in  point  is  this  passage  from  "Gil  Bias:" 

"  Je  fis  la  lecture  de  mon  ouvrage,  que  sa  majesty  n'entendre 
pas  sans  plaisir.  EUe  temoigna  qu'elle  ^tait  contente  de  monarch. 
Book  VIII.  chap.  v. 

This  passage  tells  us  that  Gil  Bias  read  his  work  to 
a  monarch,  who  was  pleased  and  who  expressed  satis- 
faction. But  although  every  word  in  the  two  sen- 
tences, except  the  participles  and  the  verbs,  has  gen- 
der, it  is  impossible  to  learn  from  this  passage  whether 
the  monarch  was  male  or  female ;  as  impossible  as 
it  is  to  do  so  from  my  paraphrase,  which  is  purposely 
ma^e  without  distinction  of  sex.  The  latter  of  the 
two  sentences  is  bewildering  to  the  common  sense  of 
an  English  reader  who  knows  the  context.  It  is.  She 
showed  that  she  was  satisfied  with  me.  Now,  the  she 
was  a  man  —  King  Philip  lY.  of  Spain.  But  in 
defiance  of  sex,  the  feminine  pronoun  is  used  because 
majesty,  not  the  quality  or  the  condition,  but  the  word 
majeste  is  feminine  !  Here  sex  is  not  expressed  by 
gender  ;  and  the  lack  of  necessary  connection  between 
sex  and  gender  is  manifest. 

In  English  we  express  only  sex  ;  that  is,  we  merely 
have  different  words  to  express  the  male  and  the  female 
of  living  things.  The  human  male  we  call  man,  the 
human  female,  woman  ;  so  we  say  boy  and  girl,  father 


THE  GRAMMARLESS  TONGUE  299 

and  mother,  brother  and  sister,  uncle  and  aunt,  bull 
and  cow,  horse  and  mare,  bullock  and  heifer,  buck  and 
doe,  cock  and  hen,  and  so  forth.  But  even  in  cases 
like  these,  icoman,  for  instance,  is  not  the  feminine 
form  of  the  word  man,  or  girl  of  hoy,  or  doe  of  hucTc, 
or  hen  of  each.  (In  Anglo-Saxon  ^oer  =  m2a\  is  mas- 
culine, but  wif—  woman  is  of  neuter  gender  !  )  And 
although  in  such  instances  as  actor,  actress,  hunter^ 
huntress,  tiger,  tigress,  the  name  of  the  female  is  a 
feminine  form  of  the  name  of  the  male,  this  has  no 
effect  upon  the  construction  of  the  sentence  ;  the  dis- 
tinction made  is  still  one  purely  of  sex,  and  not  of 
gender.  Yet  further :  in  jironouns,  although  they 
represent  nouns  belonging  to  the  two  sexes,  there  is 
no  distinction  of  gender  whatever ;  and,  what  is  the 
more  remarkable,  considering  the  ado  grammarians 
make  about  gender,  none  even  of  sex,  except  in  one 
number  of  one  person.  /,  thou,  we,  you,  they,  who, 
and  all  the  rest,  except  he,  she,  and  it,  refer  to  mascu- 
line and  feminine  persons  alike.  In  the  pronoun  of 
the  third  person  singular  we  have  a  relic  of  our  fore- 
fathers' inflected  tongue.  The  Anglo-Saxon  pronoun 
was  masculine  he,  feminine  heo,  neuter  hit,  which  are 
respectively  represented  by  our  he,  she,  it.  But  here, 
again,  the  distinction  is  of  sex,  not  of  gender,  and 
would  be  so  even  if  it  were  carried  through  all  the 
persons.  He,  she,  and  it  are  merely  words  that  stand 
for  male,  female,  and  sexless  things,  and  their  forms 
are  not  affected  by  any  "  governing "  or  requiring 
power  of  the  other  words  in  the  sentences  in  which 
they  appear.  There  is,  then,  no  gender  in  the  English 
language,  but  only  distinction  of  sex ;  that  is,  merel}^ 
we  do  not  call  a  woman  a  man,  a  hen  a  cock,  or  a 
heifer  a  bullock.    This  being  true,  it  is  impossible  that 


300  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

there  can  be  agreement  in  gender  of  nouns  or  of  pro- 
nouns. 

The  one  case  of  English  nouns,  the  possessive,  is 
equally  without  power  in  the  sentence,  upon  the  struc- 
ture of  which  it  has  no  effect  whatever.  It  merely 
expresses  possession,  and  its  power,  confined  to  that 
expression,  "  governs "  nothing,  requires  nothing, 
"  agrees  "  with  nothing.  The  reason  of  which  is,  that 
English  adjectives  and  participles  are  without  case, 
as  they  are  without  number  and  without  gender.  In 
Latin  every  word  qualifying  a  noun  in  the  genitive  or 
possessive  case,  or  closely  related  to  it,  must  be  also 
in  that  case.  Thus  we  see  upon  the  title-pages  of  the 
classics,  sentences  crammed  with  genitives  like  the 
following :  Albii  Tibulli,  Equitis  Romani  Eligiarum 
aliorumque  Carminum,  Libri  IV.  ad  optimos  codices 
emendati,  cura  Reverendissimi,  Doctissimi,  Sanctissimi 
Caroli  Bensonis  ;  that  is.  Four  books  of  the  Elegies 
and  other  poems  of  Albus  Tibullus,  a  Roman  knight, 
restored  according  to  the  best  manuscripts,  by  the  care 
of  the  most  reverend,  learned,  and  holy  Carl  Benson. 
Here,  in  Latin,  because  Tibullus  is  in  the  genitive  or 
possessive  case,  the  words  meaning  Roman  and  knight 
must  also  be  in  that  case  ;  so  with  the  word  meaning 
other,  because  that  meaning  poems  is  in  the  genitive  ; 
and  of  course  so  with  those  meaning  most  reverend, 
most  learned,  and  most  holy,  that  these  may  agree 
with  Carl  Benson.  This  is  syntax  or  grammatical 
construction.  We  English  folk  have  burst  all  those 
bonds  of  speech  forever. 

It  must  have  been  with  some  reference  to  this  topic 
that  Lindley  Murray  has  vexed  the  souls  of  genera- 
tions by  proclaiming  as  the  tenth  law  of  English  gram- 
mar, that  "  One  substantive  governs  another  signify- 


THE  GRAMMARLESS  TONGUE  301 

ing  a  different  thing  in  the  possessive  case."  Truly  an 
awful  and  a  mysterious  utterance.  It  is  about  substan- 
tives and  the  possessive  case  ;  but  what  about  them  ? 
I  can  believe  that  the  Apocalyse  is  to  be  understood 

—  hereafter  ;  I  will  undertake  to  parse  "  Sordello  "  — 
for  a  consideration  ;  but  I  admit  that  before  the  Yan- 
kee Quaker's  tenth  law  I  sit  dumfounded.  I  cannot 
begin,  or  hope  to  begin,  to  understand  it,  or  believe 
that  it  has  been,  is,  or  will  be  understood  by  any  man. 

The  assertion  that  it  is  a  law  of  the  English  lan- 
guage that  conjimctions  connect  the  same  moods  and 
tenses  of  verbs,  may  be  confuted  by  a  single  exam- 
ple to  the  contrary,  such  as,  "  I  desire,  and  have  pur- 
sued virtue,  and  should  have  been  rewarded,  if  men 
were  just."  That  sentence  is  good  English  ;  and  yet 
in  it  the  conjunction  and  connects  what  are,  according 
to  Murray  and  the  other  English  grammarians,  two 
moods  and  three  tenses. 

But  I  must  bring  this  chapter  to  an  end  ;  and  I 
may  well  do  so,  having  shown  my  readers  that  gov- 
ernment, and  agreement,  and  apposition,  and  gender 
have  no  place  in  the  construction  of  the  English 
sentence,  that  tense  is  confined  to  the  necessary  dis- 
tinction between  what  is  passing,  or  may  pass,  and 
what  has  passed,  and  case,  to  the  simple  expression  of 
possession.  This  being  the  condition  of  the  English 
language,  grammar,  in  the  usual  sense  of  the  word, 

—  i.  e.,  syntax  according  to  etymolog}'^, — -is  impossi- 
ble ;  for  inflected  forms  and  the  consequent  relations 
of  words  are  the  conditions,  sine  qua  non,  of  gram- 
mar. In  speaking  or  writing  English,  we  have  only 
to  choose  the  right  words  and  put  them  into  the  right 
places,  respecting  no  laws  but  those  of  reason,  con- 
forming to  no  order  but  that  which  we  call  "  logical." 


302  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 


NOTE. 

The  views  set  forth  in  "  The  Grammarless  Tongue "  as 
to  the  English  verb  have  met  with  an  opposition  which  I 
looked  for,  and  which,  indeed,  has  been  less  general  and 
violent  than  I  expected  it  would  be  ;  for  the  reason,  I  am 
inclined  to  think,  that  the  article  in  question  had  the  good 
fortune  to  express  the  opinions  to  which  many  silent  and 
unprofessional  thinkers  on  language  —  among  whom  I  was 
until  I  began  these  articles  —  had  been  led,  independently 
of  authority,  and  by  the  mere  force  of  right  reason. 

My  assertion  that  the  English  verb  has  but  two  tenses, 
that  it  generally  does  not  agree  with  the  nominative  in  num- 
ber and  person,  and  the  like,  bring  upon  me  the  charge, 
not  of  error,  but  of  blundering,  misstatement,  ignorance, 
and  impertinent  self-assertion.  (I  take  some  pleasure  in 
the  recapitulation.)  As  to  the  general  non-agreement  of 
the  English  verb  with  its  nominative  case,  it  is  too  manifest 
to  need  a  word  of  argument.  And  as  to  whether  a  man  in 
taking  this  position  may  justly  be  held  guilty  of  ignorant 
and  impertinent  self-assertion,  I  cite  the  following  passage 
from  Sir  John  Stoddart's  "  Universal  Grammar :  "  — 

"  The  expression  of  Number  is  another  accidental  property  of 
the  verb,  and  belongs  to  it  only  in  so  far  as  the  verb  may  be  com- 
bined with  the  expression  of  person.  .  .  .  The  verb  is  equally 
said  to  be  in  the  singular  or  plural  whether  it  has  or  has  not  dis- 
tinct terminations  appropriated  to  those  different  numbers  ;  we 
call  /  love  singular,  and  tve  love  plural  ;  but  it  is  manifest  that 
in  all  such  instances  the  expression  of  number  exists  only  in  the 
pronoun."  —  p.  155. 

Now,  it  is  the  calling  of  things  what  they  are  not,  in  order 
that  the  terminology  of  English  Grammar  may  correspond 
to  that  of  the  Greek  and  Latin  languages  which  I  think 
pernicious. 

Upon  some  of  the  points  in  question,  I  cite  the  following 
passages  from  Crombie's  "  Etymology  and  Syntax  of  the  Eng- 


THE  GRAMMARLESS  TONGUE  303 

Ush  Language."  Dr.  Crombie,  an  Oxford  Doctor  of  Laws 
and  a  Fellow  of  the  Royal  Society,  is  one  of  the  pvofound- 
est,  and  closest,  and  least  pedantic  thinkers  that  have  writ- 
ten on  our  subject ;  and  his  work  (from  the  third  and  last 
edition  of  which — London,  1830  —  I  quote)  was  made  a 
text-book  for  the  class  of  English  literature  in  the  London 
University.  Dr.  Crombie  is  examining  the  argument  of 
an  English  grammarian,  which  is  to  this  effect.  If  that 
only  is  a  tense  which  in  one  inflected  word  expresses  an  affir- 
mation with  time,  we  should  in  English  have  but  two  tenses, 
ihe  present  and  past  in  the  active  verb,  and  in  the  passive 
no  tenses  at  all,  —  the  very  position  that  I  have  taken. 
"  But,"  the  writer.  Dr.  Beattie,  adds,  "  this  is  a  needless 
nicety,  and,  if  adopted,  would  introduce  confusion  into  the 
grammatical  art.  If  amaveram  be  a  tense,  why  should  not 
amatus  fueram  ?  If  /  heard  be  a  tense,  /  did  hear,  I  have 
heard,  and  /  shall  hear  must  be  equally  entitled  to  that 
appellation."     This  argument  Crombie  thus  sets  aside  :  — 

"  How  simplicity  can  introduce  confusion  I  am  unable  to  com- 
prehend, unless  we  are  to  affirm  that  the  introduction  of  Greek 
and  Latin  names,  to  express  nonentities  in  our  language,  is  necessary 
to  illustrate  the  grammar  and  simplify  the  study  of  the  language 
to  the  English  scholar.  .  .  .  Nay,  further,  if  it  be  a  needless 
nicety  to  admit  those  only  as  tenses  which  are  formed  by  inflec- 
tion, is  it  not  equally  a  needless  nicety  to  admit  those  cases  only 
which  are  formed  by  varying  the  termination  ?  And  if  confu- 
sion be  introduced  by  denying  /  had  heard  to  be  a  tense,  why  does 
not  the  learned  author  simplify  the  doctrine  of  English  nouns  by 
giving  them  six  cases  —  a  king,  of  a  king,  to  or  for  a  king,  a  king, 
O  king,  with,  from,  in,  or  by  a  king  ?  This,  surely,  would  be  to  per- 
plex, not  to  simplify.  In  short,  the  inconsistency  of  those  gram- 
marians who  deny  that  to  be  a  case  which  is  not  formed  by  inflec- 
tion, yet  would  load  us  with  moods  and  tenses  not  formed  by 
change  of  termination,  is  so  palpable  as  to  require  neither  illus- 
tration nor  argument  to  oppose  it.  .  .  .  Why  do  not  these  gen- 
tlemen favor  us  with  a  dual  number,  with  a  middle  voice,  and 
with  an  optative  mood  ?  Nay,  as  they  are  so  fond  of  tenses  as 
to  lament  tha,t  we  rob  them  of  all  but  two,  why  do  they  not  en- 


304  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

rich  us  with  a  first  and  second  aorist  and  a,  paulo  post  future  ? ''* 
(pp.  118,  119.)  "  Whether  amatus  fueram  be  or  be  not  a  tense 
is  the  very  point  in  question  ;  and  so  far  am  I  from  admitting 
the  affirmative  as  unquestionable,  that  I  contend  it  has  no  more 
claim  to  the  designation  of  these  than  eao/xai  rertpcis  —  no  more 
claim  than  amandum  est  mihi,  amari  oportet,  or  amandus  sum  have 
to  be  called  moods.  Here  I  must  request  the  reader  to  bear  in 
mind  the  necessary  distinction  between  the  grammar  of  a  language 
and  its  capacity  of  expression.  .  .  .  Why  not  give,  as  English 
cases,  to  a  king,  of  a  king,  with  a  king,  etc.  ?  The  mode  is  cer- 
tainly applicable,  whatever  may  be  the  consequences  of  that  ap- 
plication. A  case  surely  is  as  easily  formed  by  a  noun  and  a 
preposition  as  a  tense  by  a  participle  and  an  auxiliary  "  (p.  121). 
"  What  should  we  think  of  that  person's  discernment  who  should 
contend  that  the  Latins  had  an  optative  mood  because  utinam 
legeres  signifies,  I  wish  you  would  read  ?  It  is  equally  absurd  to 
say  that  we  have  an  imperfect,  preterpluperfect,  or  future  tense  ; 
or  that  we  have  all  the  Greek  varieties  of  mood,  and  two  voices, 
because  by  the  aid  of  auxiliary  words  and  definitive  terms  we  con- 
trive to  express  these  accidents,  times,  or  states  of  being.  I  con- 
sider, therefore,  that  loe  have  no  more  cases,  moods,  tenses,  or  voices 
in  our  language  —  as  far  as  its  grammar,  not  its  capacity  of  ex- 
pression, is  concerned  —  than  we  have  variety  of  termination  to 
denote  these  different  accessory  ideas." — pp.  127,  128. 

But  upon  this  point  I  cite  also  the  following  passage  from 
a  yet  higher  authority,  —  Bosworth,  —  in  the  front  rank  of 
the  Anglo-Saxon  and  English  scholars  of  the  world,  who 
speaks  as  follows  upon  the  subject,  at  p.  189  of  the  Intro- 
duction to  his  Anglo-Saxon  Dictionary.  The  passage,  it 
will  be  seen,  touches  what  I  have  said,  and  upon  voices  and 
cases  as  well  as  upon  tenses. 

"  What  is  generally  termed  the  passive  voice  has  no  existence 
in  Anglo-Saxon,  any  more  than  in  modern  English.  The  Anglo- 
Saxons  wrote,  he  is  lufod,  he  is  loved.  Here  is  is  the  indicative 
indefinite  of  the  neuter  verb  wesan,  and  lufod,  loved,  is  the  past 
participle  of  the  verb  lufian,  to  love.  In  parsing,  every  word 
should  be  considered  a  distinct  part  of  speech.  To  a  king  is  not 
called  a  dative  case  in  English,  as  regi  in  Latin,  because  the  Eng- 
lish phrase  is  not  formed  by  inflection,  but  by  the  auxiliary  words 


THE   GRAMMARLESS   TONGUE  305 

io  a.  If  auxiliaries  do  uot  form  cases  in  English  nouns,  why 
should  they  be  allowed  to  form  various  tenses  and  a  passive  voice 
either  in  the  English,  or  in  its  parent,  the  Saxon  ?  Thus,  Ic 
maeg  beon  lufod,  1  may  be  loved,  instead  of  being  called  the  po- 
tential mood  passive,  maeg  is  more  rationally  considered  a  verb 
in  the  indicative  mood,  indefinite  tense,  first  singular,  beon  the 
neuter  verb  in  the  infinitive  mood  after  the  verb  maeg  ;  lufod  is 
the  perfect  participle  of  the  verb  lujian." 

This  view  is  exactly  the  same,  it  will  be  seen,  as  that 
which  is  taken  of  the  subject  by  Crombie  ;  and,  indeed,  it  is 
hard  for  me  to  understand  how  any  man  of  common  sense, 
who  thinks  for  himself,  can  take  any  other.  Bosworth 
here  supports  the  main  position  taken  in  "  The  Grammar- 
less  Tongue,"  which  is  in  effect,  to  use  Bosworth's  words, 
that  in  analyzing  the  English  sentence,  "  every  word  should 
be  considered  a  distinct  part  of  speech  ;  "  every  word,  aux- 
iliary verbs  as  well  as  auxiliary  prepositions,  as  he  regards 
them  in  his  analysis  of  what  English  grammarians  call  the 
first  person  singular,  present  indicative,  potential  mood, 
passive  voice  of  the  verb  to  love  —  /  may  be  loved.  That 
is  the  point  of  this  whole  question. 

Against  the  position  taken  in  the  foregoing  chapter  as  to 
the  so-called  tenses  which  are  formed  by  the  union  of  a 
verb  and  a  participle,  —  that  the  verb  retains  its  jiroper 
meaning ;  e.  g.,  that  in  I  have  loved,  have  expresses  pos- 
session, —  a  position  impregnable,  I  think,  to  argument,  — 
two  of  my  critics  have  directed  the  shafts  of  feeble  ridicule. 
One  says,  "  He,  therefore,  who  has  loved,  has,  in  his  pos- 
session, an  abstract  completed  action,  bearing  the  name 
'  loved.'  Such  a  person  may  well  be  excused  for  inquiring 
with  some  anxiety  what  he  shall  do  with  it."  Another  flouts 
the  pretensions  of  a  man  who  dared  to  write  about  language, 
and  yet  "  thought  that  a  participle  could  be  the  object  to  a 
verb." 

Now,  in  the  first  place,  Bosworth's  dictum  —  say  rather 
his  primal  law  of  English  construction  —  that,  in  parsing, 
every  word  should  be  regarded  as  a  distinct  part  of  speech, 


308  WORDS  AND   THEIR  USES 

covers  this  ground  entirely.  The  case  of  a  verb  followed 
by  a  participle  is  no  more  than  any  other  excluded  from  the 
operation  of  that  law,  which,  indeed,  as  we  have  seen, 
Bosworth  himself  illustrates  by  an  analysis  of  the  so-caUed 
tense  /  may  be  loved.  "What  I  have  written  upon  this  point 
is  therefore  merely  an  expression  and  particular  enforce- 
ment of  a  general  law  recognized  by  the  facile  princeps  of 
British  Anglo-Saxon  scholars.  But  I  am  not  left  without  a 
particular  justification  of  my  view  of  the  relation  of  the 
auxiliary  verb  to  its  participle.  Dr.  Crombie,  explaining 
the  difference  between  the  tenses  which  some  grammarians 
have  called  the  preterite  definite,  /  have  written,  and  the 
preterite  indefinite,  /  ivrote,  furnishes  me  with  the  following 
opinion  in  point :  — 

"  When  an  action  is  done  in  a  time  continuous  to  the  present 
instant,  we  employ  the  auxiliary  verb.  Thus,  on  finishing  a  let- 
ter, I  say,  I  have  written  my  letter,  i.  e.,  I  possess  (now)  the  fin- 
ished action  of  writing  a  letter.  Again,  when  an  action  is  done  in 
a  space  of  time  which  the  mind  assumes  as  present,  or  when  we 
express  our  immediate  possession  of  things  done  in  that  space, 
we  use  the  auxiliary  verb.  '  I  have  this  week  written  several 
letters,'  /  have  now  the  perfection  of  writing  several  letters  finished 
this  week.  These  phraseologies,  as  the  author  last  quoted  justly 
observes,  are  harsh  to  the  ear,  and  appear  exceedingly  awkward  ; 
but  a  little  attention  will  suffice  to  show  that  they  correctly  ex- 
hibit the  ideas  implied  by  the  tense  which  we  have  at  present 
under  consideration."  — Etymology,  etc.,  p.  166. 

Upon  the  same  subject,  one  of  my  critics  has  the  follow- 
ing passage,  which  is  useful  in  enabling  me  to  illustrate  my 
position :  — 

"  All  participles  are  adjectives,  and  cannot,  without  being 
made  substantives  by  the  prefixing  of  the  article,  or  in  some  simi- 
lar way,  be  used  as  objects  to  transitive  verbs.  We  can,  of 
course,  say.  He  posits  the  conditioned  ;  but  we  cannot  say.  He  pos- 
its conditioned,  or  He  possesses  conditioned.  In  the  third  place, 
suppose  we  admit  that  a  participle  could  be  the  object  of  a  trans- 
itive verb,  and  that  I  possessed  conditioned  expressed  what  we 


THE   GRAMMARLESS   TONGUE  307 

mean  by  I  have  conditioned  ;  is  there  not  one  respect  in  wliicli  / 
have  conditioned  or  1  have  loved  differs  from  /  have  money  ?  We 
can  certainly  say  /  have  loved  the  ocean  ;  but  can  we  also  say  / 
have  money  the  hank  f  I  have  hunted  the  fox  does  mean  some- 
thing ;  /  have  a  hunt  the  fox  means  nothing." 

Clearly  all  participles  are  adjectives  when  they  are  pred- 
icated of  the  subject,  or  used  to  qualify  a  noun.  That  is 
so  obviously  true  that  it  hardly  needs  to  be  asserted.  Thus, 
in  I  am  good,  and  /  am  loved,  good  and  loved  are  equally 
adjectives,  as  in  a  bad  man  and  a  hated  man,  bad  and  hated 
are  also  adjectives.  But  I  am  not  so  sure  that  the  prefixing 
of  an  article,  or  the  like,  is  the  condition  and  sign  of  use  as 
an  object  of  a  transitive  verb.  I  am  overwhelmed  with 
such  a  tremendous  illustration  of  the  use  of  participles,  as 
He  2^osits  the  conditioned.  It  takes  me  back,  however,  to 
the  days  when  Tappan  and  Henry  led  my  youthful  steps 
through  the  floweiy  paths,  and  fed  my  downy  lips  with  the 
sweet  and  succulent  fruits  of  metapheezic.  Of  this  experi- 
ence I  retain  sufficient  memory  to  admit,  with  shame  and 
confusion  of  face,  that  we  can  say,  He  posits  the  condi- 
tioned, and  that  we  cannot  say,  He  posits  conditioned,  or 
He  possesses  conditioned.  But  when,  stepping  down  from 
the  sublime  of  the  conditioned,  I  reflect  that  although  we 
may  say  of  Paddy,  He  bolts  the  pratie,  we  may  not  say, 
He  bolts  pratie,  or  He  possesses  pratie,  and  yet  that  we  may 
say.  He  bolts  praties,  and  even.  He  likes  bolting  praties,  I 
am  comforted.  I  admit  that  although  we  may  say,  /  have 
loved  the  ocean,  we  may  not  say,  I  have  money  the  bank, 
unless  we  would  talk  nonsense.  But  that  is  because  loved 
the  ocean,  which  in  one  case  is  the  object  of  the  verb  have, 
is  sense,  and  money  the  bank,  which  is  its  object  in  the  other 
case,  is  not  sense.  As  a  phrase  or  sentence  may  be  the  sub- 
ject of  a  verb,  so  it  may  be  its  object.  For  example,  in  the 
sentence,  He  likes  bolting,  the  participle,  although  no  arti- 
cle is  prefixed  to  it,  is  the  object  of  the  transitive  verb  likes  ; 
but  in  the  more  complex,  fully-developed,  and  well-rounded. 


308  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

sentence,  He  likes  bolting  praties,  the  object  of  the  verb  is 
bolting  praties. 

I  have  called  English  the  grammarless  tongue  ;  but  it 
merits  that  distinction  only  because  it  excels  in  its  superi- 
ority  to  inflections,  and  its  regard  for  the  logical  sequence 
of  thought,  all  other  languages  of  civilized  Christendom. 
Compared  with  Greek  and  Latin,  the  French,  Italian,  and 
Spanish  languages,  and  even  the  German,  may  be  called 
grammarless.  Indeed,  the  tendency  to  the  laying  aside  of 
inflections  showed  itself  early  in  the  Latin  tongue,  in  the 
very  Augustan  period  of  which  we  find  in  the  best  writers 
the  germ  of  our  method  of  expressing  action  in  combination 
with  the  idea  of  time,  by  the  use  of  the  verbs  signifying 
existence  and  possession,  in  combination  with  participles. 
Cicero,  instead  of  De  Csesare  satis  dixi,  said,  "  De  Csesare 
satis  dictum  habeo"  —  I  have  said  enough  of  Caesar  ;  and 
Caesar  himself  wrote,  "  copias  quas  habebat  paratas,"  instead 
of  paraverat  —  the  forces  which  he  had  prepared.^  Now, 
will  any  one  pretend  that  when  Cicero  said  habeo  dictum  — 
I  have  said,  he  used  the  word  habeo  without  the  idea  of  posses- 
sion, and  yet  that  he  used  it  with  that  idea  when  he  said  habeo 
yomum  —  I  have  an  apple  ?  I  think  no  one  will  do  so  who  is 
competent  to  write  on  language  at  all ;  and  should  there  be 
such  a  person,  I  confess  at  once  that  I  cannot  argue  with  him. 
We  do  not  approach  each  other  near  enough  to  clash.  And 
as  to  the  questions  whether  English  verbs  have  real  tenses, 
and  what  is  the  force  of  "  auxiliary  "  verbs  in  all  cases,  I 
shall  leave  them  without  further  discussion,  merely  giving 
my  readers  an  example  upon  which  to  ruminate.  If  /  shall 
have  followed  is  a  tense,  the  future  perfect  tense  of  the  verb 
to  folloiv,  in  which  the  verb  shall  does  not  express  futurity, 
and  the  verb  Ziave  does  not  express  possession,  what  becomes 
of  that  tense,  and  what  is  the  meaning  of  those  verbs,  when, 
instead  of  saying,  I  shall  have  followed  him  so  long  to-mor- 

1  These  examples  I  find  to  my  hand,  among  others  of  the 
same  sort,  in  Brachet's  "  Grammaire  Historique  de  la  Laugue 
Fran^aise." 


THE  GRAMMARLESS  TONGUE  309 

row,  we  say,  I  shall  to-morrow  have  followed  him  so  long, 
or,  I  shall  to-morrow  have  so  long  followed  him,  or,  I  shall 
have  so  long  followed  him  to-morrow  ?  If  a  tense  may  be 
split  ill  pieces  and  scattered  about  in  this  way,  and  its  com- 
ponent parts,  each  of  them  a  word  in  constant  and  inde- 
pendent use,  may  retain  in  their  divided  condition  the  same 
modified  meaning  or  lack  of  meaning  which  they  have  in 
combination,  it  would  seem  that  the  construction  of  Englisli, 
according  to  the  grammarians,  is  so  absolved  from  the  laws 
of  reason,  which  hold  on  all  other  subjects,  that  any  discus- 
sion of  it  in  conformity  with  those  laws  must  be  entirely 
superfluous  and  from  the  purpose. 

A  volume  like  this  is  not  the  place  for  controversjs  even 
were  I  inclined  thereto  ;  but  I  will  notice  one  or  two  of  the 
remarks  elicited  by  the  foregoing  chapter  from  writers  who, 
I  am  sorry  to  say,  were  not  pretentious  ignoramuses,  but 
men  of  sense  and  some  philological  acquirement,  because 
these  examples  will  show  the  style  and  temper  of  even  the 
ablest  of  my  opponents.  One  of  them  sneered  at  the  views 
set  forth  in  that  chapter,  because,  among  other  things,  they 
were  those  of  a  man  who  ''  could  make  TeTvij/ofj-at.  a  future 
perfect,"  meaning,  I  shall  have  been  beaten.  As  to  that 
point,  I  cite  the  following  passages  from  a  grammarian  of 
authority  :  — 

"  The  third  future,  or  paulo  post  future,  of  the  passive  in 
respect  to  siguifieation  (§  139),  and  form  is  derived  from  the 
perfect  passive,  of  which  it  retains  the  augment,  substituting 
treyuot  for  the  termination  of  the  perfect  passive.  It  is  therefore 
only  necessary  to  take  the  ending  of  the  second  person  perfect 
passive  in  ffai  (tf ai,  |ai)  and  change  the  ai  into  ofj.ai  —  rfrvfi/jLai  (rerv- 
ipai),  rerinl/o/xai."  —  Buttman,  §  99. 

"  The  third,  or  paulo  post  future,  is  properly,  both  in  form 
and  in  signification,  compounded  from  the  perfect  and  future. 
It  places  what  is  passed  or  concluded  in  the  future;  e.  g.,  v  iro\i- 
reia  reXeccs  KeKocr/XT}(TfTai.  fau  d  towvtos  avr^v  (TriffKOirrj  fvKa^  —  The 
city  will  have  been  perfectly  organized  if  such  a  watchman  over- 
see it  ;  i.  e.,  disposita  erit,  not  disponetur."  —  Ibidem,  §  139. 


310  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

This  is  Greek,  as  I  learned  it.  I  do  not  pretend  to  write 
a  new  Cratylus,  or  profess  to  be  able  to  do  so. 

Another  of  my  censors  is  facetiously  severe  upon  a  man 
who  ventures  to  write  on  language,  and  yet  himself  uses 
such  phrases  as  "  a  young-eyed  cherubin,"  and  "  poning  the 
gutter."  This  writer,  although  he  figured  in  the  Philologi- 
cal Convention  at  Poughkeepsie,  seems  not  to  know  that 
cheruhin  came  into  our  language  from  the  Italian  cherubino, 
and  that  until  a  very  late  period  the  form  cherub  was  not 
known.  And  as  to  the  particular  phrase  I  used,  if  my 
very  scornful  censor  will  take  a  poor  mariner's  advice,  and 
overhaul  his  little  Shakespeare,  he  will  find,  in  a  passage 
famous  (among  the  ignorant)  for  its  beauty,  the  following 
lines :  — 

"  There  's  not  the  smallest  orb  which  thou  beholdest 
But  in  his  motion  like  an  angel  sings, 
Still  quiring  to  the  young-eyed  cherubins." 

Merchant  of  Venice,  V.  i. 

Now,  if  very  learned  and  scornful  professors  of  philology 
will  not,  before  criticising  a  poor  layman  like  me,  and  before 
figuring  at  philological  conventions,  make  themselves  ac- 
quainted with  such  familiar  passages  of  poetry  as  that,  why, 
all  the  worse  for  me  —  and  for  Shakespeare. 

As  to  "  poning  the  gutter,"  that  is  a  city  boy's  name  for 
a  city  boy's  amusement.  In  winter,  when  a  hard  frost  has 
filled  the  gutters  with  ice,  boys  make  slides  on  them,  and 
as  they  dash  down  the  slide  and  run  up  again  to  take  a  start 
from  the  head,  they  cry  out  one  to  another,  "  Pon  the  gut- 
ter. "  Therefore,  although  the  origin  of  the  first  word  is 
unknown  to  me,  I  said  of  my  young-eyed  cherubin,  that 
"  five  years  ago  he,  rustic,  was  milking  the  cow,  or  urban, 
was  poning  the  gutter." 

With  this  answer  I  shall  leave  my  critics  in  charge  of  my 
reputation,  and  their  own. 


CHAPTER  XI 

IS   BEING   DONE 

To  a  man  who  has  reached  what  Dante  calls  the 
middle  of  the  journey  of  our  life,  nothing  in  the  out- 
side world  is  more  remarkable  than  the  unconscious 
freedom  with  which  people  ten  or  fifteen  years  younger 
than  himself  adopt  new  fashions  and  fangles  of  dress, 
of  manners,  and  of  speech,  excej)t,  perhaps,  their  per- 
sistence in  these  novelties  after  the  absurdity  thereof 
has  been  fully  set  forth  and  explained.  His  difficulty 
is  that  for  a  long  time  he  does  not  see  —  does  not 
unless  he  combines,  unusually,  quickness  of  penetra- 
tion and  readiness  of  reflection  —  that  what  seems  so 
new  and  strange  to  him  seems  to  younger  people 
neither  strange  nor  new.  The  things  are  new,  indeed, 
to  them,  but  only  in  that  they  are  not  yet  old  ;  they 
are  not  novelties  that  disturb  their  peace  as  they 
disturb  his.  He  wonders  that  that  beautiful  girl  of 
seventeen  goes  about  in  public  unconcerned,  and  in 
fact  almost  unnoticed,  —  that  is  the  strangest  feature 
of  the  case, —  in.  such  amazing  apparel  as  would  ten 
years  ago  have  made  her  mother  the  laughing-stock 
of  the  whole  town,  and  which  yet  she  wears  as  calmly 
as  if  from  Eve's  day  down  the  sex  had  known  no  other 
garments.  Why  shoidd  she  not  ?  The  fashion  of 
to-day  is  all  that  she  knows  of  fashion,  and  she  cares 
to  know  no  more,  except  for  the  sake  of  curiosity. 


312  WORDS  AND   THEIR  USES 

All  the  rest  is  to  her  in  the  keeping  of  history,  where 
she  may,  perhaps,  in  an  idle  moment,  look  at  it,  and 
find  it  food  for  wonder  or  for  laughter.  In  it  there 
is  naught  to  her  of  personal  concern. 

When  does  a  fashion  cease  to  be  new  ?  When  does 
it  become  old  ?  when  obsolete  ?  Before  these  questions 
can  be  answered,  we  must  know  the  measure  of  time 
used  by  him  who  asks  them.  What  would  be  new  to 
a  young  elephant  of  thirty  or  forty  years  would  be 
old  to  an  aged  cony  of  nine  or  ten ;  what  to  the  but- 
terfly of  a  meadow  and  a  summer  would  date  from 
the  beginning  of  all  things,  would  hardly  be  a  memory 
to  an  eagle  that  had  soared  for  half  a  century  above 
half  a  continent.  What  is  new  to  one  man  may  be  old 
to  men  only  five  years  younger  than  he,  and  to  men  ten 
years  younger,  obsolete.  Few  truths  are  more  difficult 
of  apprehension  than  this,  apparently  so  obvious. 
Few  mental  faculties  are  rarer  than  that  which  gives 
to  a  mature  man  the  prompt,  intuitive  recognition  of 
the  fact  that  there  are  human  beings  whose  opinions 
and  habits,  if  not  worthy  of  consideration,  must  yet 
be  considered,  to  whom  that  which  is  to  him  a  part  of 
the  present  is  not  merely  unfamiliar,  but  shut  out 
among  the  things  of  the  past  as  completely  as  the 
siege  of  Troy,  or  the  building  of  the  Pyramids.  Five 
thousand  years  ago,  five  hundred,  fifty,  five  —  what  is 
the  difference  as  to  that  which  is  beyond  the  grasp  of 
consciousness,  out  of  the  record  of  experience  ? 

This  elasticity  of  the  standard  by  which  the  new  is 
measured  is  in  no  respect  more  worthy  of  consideration 
than  in  that  of  language.  Unless  a  man  is  a  monster 
of  pedantry  and  priggishness,  —  and,  indeed,  not  then, 
—  the  words  and  the  forms  of  speech  he  uses  are  not 
made,  or  even  chosen,  by  himself.     The  first  condi- 


IS   BEING   DONE  313 

tion  o£  lans:ua2:e  —  that  it  shall  be  a  means  of  com- 
inunication  between  men  —  forbids  the  near  approach 
to  a  vocabulary  or  a  construction  which  is,  even  in 
part,  the  work  or  the  choice  of  any  one  man.  As  we 
get  our  food  and  our  breath  from  the  earth  and  the 
air  around  us,  so  we  get  our  language  from  our  neigh- 
bors —  not  the  language  in  which  we  work  out  and 
discuss  questions  in  science,  in  art,  or  in  letters,  but 
that  which  serves  the  needs  of  our  daily  life.  A  little 
comes  to  us  from  abroad ;  but  this  is  mere  spicery, 
much  of  which  is  neither  wholesome  nor  appetizing. 

A  fastidious  precisian  in  language  might  carry  his 
nicety  so  far  as  to  leave  himself  almost  speechless.  A 
man  must  speak  the  language  of  his  people  and  his 
time.  As  to  the  first,  there  can  be  no  doubt ;  but 
what  is  his  time  ?  Generally,  to-day.  If  A  hears  B 
use  a  word  or  a  phrase  to-day  whicl;,  although  it  is 
entirely  new  to  him,  has  a  meaning  that  he  readily 
apprehends,  and  that  saves  trouble,  and  "  will  do,"  he 
will  use  it  himself,  if  he  has  need,  to-morrow.  And 
so  it  will  0:0  on  from  mouth  to  mouth  until  within  a 
year  it  may  pervade  a  neighborhood }  and  in  these 
days  of  railways  and  newspapers,  a  year  or  two  may 
spread  it  over  a  whole  country.  The  child  that  was 
in  the  cradle  when  the  new  word  first  wf,s  spoken,  on 
going  to  school  finds  it  a  part  of  the  common  speech, 
For  that  child  it  is  neither  new  nor  old  ;  it  simply  is. 
And  that  impression  of  its  far-off,  unkno^Ti  origin  -^ 
for  "  I  am  "  expresses  the  eternal  —  the  child  will 
carry  through  life,  although  he  may  afterward  learn 
that  it  was  new  when  he  first  heard  it.  But  to  him 
who  was  a  man  when  the  word  came  in,  and  who  re- 
flects at  all  upon  the  language  that  he  uses,  it  will 
always  have  upon  it  the  stamp  of  newness,  because 


314  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

it  is  one  of  the  things  of  which  he  remembers  the 
beginning. 

In  bad  eminence,  at  the  head  of  those  intruders  in 
language  which  to  many  persons  seem  to  be  of  estab- 
lished respectability,  but  the  right  of  which  to  be  at 
all  is  not  yet  fully  admitted,  stands  out  the  form  of 
speech  is  being  done,  or  rather,  is  being,  which,  about 
seventy  or  eighty  years  ago,  began  to  affront  the  eye, 
torment  the  ear,  and  assault  the  common  sense  of  the 
speaker  of  plain  and  idiomatic  English.  That  it 
should  be  pronounced  a  novelty  will  seem  strange  to 
most  of  my  readers  ;  for  we  have  all  heard  it  from  our 
earliest  childhood.  But  so  slow  has  been  its  accept- 
ance among  unlettered  people,  so  stoutly  has  it  been 
resisted  by  the  lettered,  that  we  have  heard  it  under 
constant  protest ;  yet  it  is  so  much  used,  and  seems  to 
suit  so  well  the  mental  tone  of  those  who  now  do  most 
to  mould  the  common  speech,  that  to  check  its  diffu- 
sion would  be  a  hopeless  undertaking.  But  to  exam- 
ine it  may  be  worth  our  while,  for  the  sake  of  a  lesson 
in  language. 

Mr.  Marsh  says  of  this  form  of  speech,  that  it  is 
"an  awkward  neologism,  which  neither  convenience, 
intelligibility,  nor  syntactical  congruity  demands," 
and  that  it  is  the  contrivance  of  some  grammarian. 
But  that  it  is  the  work  of  any  grammarian  is  more 
than  doubtful.  Grammarians,  with  all  their  faults, 
do  not  deform  language  with  fantastic  solecisms,  or 
even  seek  to  enrich  it  with  new  and  startling  verbal 
combinations.  They  rather  resist  novelty,  and  devote 
themselves  to  formulating  that  which  use  has  already 
established.  It  can  hardly  be  that  such  an  incongru- 
ous and  ridiculous  form  of  speech  as  is  being  done 
was  contrived  by  a  man  who,  by  any  stretching  of  the 


IS   BEING   DONE  315 

name,  should  be  included  among-  grammarians.  But, 
nevertheless,  it  is  a  worthy  offspring  of  English  gram- 
mar ;  a  fitting,  and,  I  may  say,  an  inevitable  conse- 
quence of  the  attempt  to  make  our  mother  tongue 
order  herself  by  Latin  rules  and  standards.  Some 
precise  and  feeble-minded  soul,  having  been  taught 
that  there  is  a  passive  voice  in  English,  and  that,  for 
instance,  huilding  is  an  active  participle,  and  hu'dded 
or  huilt  a  passive,  felt  conscientious  scruples  at  say- 
ing. The  house  is  building.  For  what  could  the  house 
build  ?  A  house  cannot  build  ;  it  must  be  built.  And 
yet  to  say,  The  house  is  built,  is  to  say  (I  speak 
for  him),  that  it  is  finished,  that  it  is  "done  built." 
Therefore  we  must  find  some  form  that  will  be  a  con- 
tinuing present  tense  of  this  passive  verb  to  he  huilt ; 
and  he  found  it,  as  he  thought,  in  the  form  is  being 
huilt ;  supposing  that,  by  the  introduction  of  the  pre- 
sent participle,  expressive  of  continued  existence,  be- 
tween is  and  huilt ^  he  had  modified  the  meaning  both 
of  the  former  and  the  latter.  Others,  like  him,  half 
taught  and  badly  taught,  precise  and  fussy,  caught  up 
the  phrase  which  seemed  to  them  to  supply  a  defi- 
ciency in  their  passive  voice,  and  so  the  infection 
spread  over  England,  and  ere  long  into  this  republic. 
It  was  confined,  however,  to  the  condition  of  life  in 
which  it  had  its  origin.  Simple-minded  common  peo- 
ple and  those  of  culture  were  alike  protected  against 
it  by  their  attachment  to  the  idiom  of  their  mother 
tongue,  with  which  they  felt  it  to  be  directly  at  vari- 
ance. 

To  this  day  there  is  not,  in  the  Old  England  or  the 
New,  a  farmer's  boy  who  has  escaped  the  contamina- 
tion of  popular  weekly  papers,  who  would  not  say. 
While  the  new  barn  was  a-building,  unless  some  prim 


316  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

schoolma'am  had  taught  him  to  say,  was  being  built ; 
and,  at  the  other  extreme  of  culture,  Macaulay  writes, 
"  Chelsea  Hospital  was  building,"  "  While  innocent 
blood  was  shedding,"  "  While  the  foulest  judicial  mur- 
der that  had  disgraced  even  those  times  was  perpe- 
trating." 

Mr.  Dickens  writes  (Sergeant  Buzfuz's  speech), 
"  The  train  was  preparing."  In  the  "  Atlantic 
Monthly"  for  May,  1869,  I  find,  "Another  flank 
movement  was  making,  but  thus  far  with  little  ef- 
fect ; "  and  in  the  "  Brooklyn  Eagle "  for  June  13, 
1869,  "  St.  Ann's  Church,  which  has  been  building  for 
nearly  two  years  on  the  corner  of  Livingston  and 
Clinton  streets."  I  cite  these  miscellaneous  writers 
to  show  modem  and  common  usage,  meaning  to  set 
up  neither  the  "  Brooklyn  Eagle  "  nor  Mr.  Dickens 
as  a  very  high  authority  in  the  use  of  language. 

And  thus,  to  go  no  farther  back  than  the  Eliza- 
bethan period.  Bishop  Jewel  wrote,  "  Some  other 
there  be  that  see  and  know  that  the  Church  of  God  is 
now  a  building,  and  yet,  not  onely  refrain  themselves 
from  the  worke,  but  also  spurne  downe  that  other  men 
have  built  up."  (Sermons,  ed.  1583,  fol.  F.  vii.) 
"  After  the  Temple  was  buylded,  or  was  in  building, 
and  rearing,  Esdras  the  prophet  read  the  Law  of  God." 
{Idem.  G.  vi.)  And  Bishop  Hall,  "  While  my  body 
is  dressing,  not  with  an  effeminate  curiosity,  nor  yet 
with  rude  neglect,  my  mind  addresses  herself  to  her 
ensuing  task  ;  "  and  Shakespeare, 

"  and  when  he  thinks,  good  easy  man, 
His  greatness  is  a-ripening.' ' 

Henry  VIII. 

Thus  Milton  wrote,  "  While  the  Temple  of  the  Lord 
Jcas  building ; "  Bolingbroke,  "  The  nation  had  cried 


IS   BEING   DONE  317 

out  loutUy  against  the  crime  which  was  committing ; " 
and  Johnson  wrote  to  Boswell,  "  My  '  Lives  '  are  re- 
jirinting."  Hence  we  see  that  the  form  is  being  donc^ 
is  being  made,  is  being  built,  hicks  the  support  of 
authoritative  usage  from  the  period  of  the  earliest 
classical  English  to  the  present  day.  That,  however, 
it  might  do  without  if  it  were  consistent  with  reason, 
and  conformed  to  the  normal  development  of  the  lan- 
guage, else  there  would  be  no  growth  of  language. 
But  that  very  consistency  and  conformity  it  lacks. 
Let  us  see  why  and  how. 

The  condition  sought  to  be  expressed  by  is  being 
done  is  not  new  in  any  sense.  It  is  neither  a  new 
shade  of  thought  nor  a  new-born  idea.  On  the  con- 
trary, it  is  one  of  the  first  conditions  that  need  ex- 
pression. It  has  been  expressed  in  many  languages 
from  remote  ages,  and  very  completely  in  English  for 
centuries.  At  best  the  phrase  is  merely  a  new  name 
for  an  old  thing  already  well  named.  Those  who  use 
it  seem  to  me  to  disregard  the  fitness  of  the  forms 
of  speech  by  which  the  thought  which  they  would 
present  has  been  uttered  by  our  best  writers  and 
speakers.  For  example,  Hamlet  says  to  the  king,  of 
the  slain  Polonius,  that  the  latter  is  at  sapper,  "  not 
where  he  eats,  but  where  he  is  eaten  ;  "  and  the  words 
fully  express — there  has  never  been  a  doubt  sug- 
gested by  the  most  microscopic  commentator  that 
they  express  —  just  what  Hamlet  meant,  that  the  eat- 
ing of  Polonius  was  going  on  at  the  time  then  pre- 
sent. "  Is  eaten  "  does  not  mean  has  been  eaten  up. 
It  is  in  the  present  tense,  and  expresses  what  has  been 
called  "  the  continuous  recipience  of  action,"  as  much 
as  /  eat  expresses  continuous  action.  Hamlet  goes 
on  to  say,  "  A  certain  convocation  of  politic  worms 
ure  e'en  at  him."     So  Hotspur  says,  — 


318  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

"  Why,  look  you,  I  am  ivhqyp'd  and  scourged  with  roda, 
Nettled  and  stung  with  ijismires  when  I  hear 
Of  this  vile  politician,  Boliugbroke." 

It  was  not  necessary  for  Hotspur,  although  he  spoke 
of  time  present,  to  say,  "  I  am  being  whipped,  being 
scourged,  being  nettled,  being  stung,  when  I  hear," 
or  for  Hamlet  to  say  that  Polonius  was  being  eaten, 
although  the  worms  were  at  him  while  the  prince  was 
speaking. 

It  will  be  of  some  interest  to  observe  how  this  idea 
has  been  expressed  in  various  languages,  including 
English.  It  may  be,  and  has  been,  expressed,  both 
participially  and  verbally.  In  the  New  Testament 
(1  Peter  iii.  20)  there  is  the  following  passage  in 
the  original :  ev  rj/x€pai<;  Nwe,  /caTao-KCua^o/xei'r;?  ki(3(otov, 
which,  in  our  English  version,  is  translated  thus  :  "  In 
the  days  of  Noah,  while  the  ark  was  a-preparingJ^ 
Here  the  last  clause  represents  the  Greek  passive  par- 
ticiple present  used  absolutely  with  the  substantivCv 
according  to  the  Greek  idiom.  In  the  translation  of 
1582  we  find,  "  when  the  ark  was  a-huilding  ;  "  in 
that  of  1557,  "  while  the  ark  was  preparing  ;  "  but 
in  Wycliffe's  translation,  made  about  A.  D.  1380,  "  In 
the  days  of  Noe,  when  the  ship  was  made.'^  The  last 
form,  which  corresponds  to  Hamlet's  "  not  where  he 
eats,  but  where  he  is  eaten^''  represents  the  imperfect 
subjunctive  passive,  "  cum  fahricaretur  arca^''  of  the 
Vulgate,  from  which  Wycliffe  made  his  translation. 
In  the  account  of  the  building  of  Solomon's  temple  is 
another  passage  (1  Kings  vi.  7),  which  serves  in  illus- 
tration :  "  And  the  house,  when  it  was  in  huilding^ 
was  huilt  of  stone  made  ready  before  it  was  brought 
thither  ;  so  that  there  was  neither  hammer,  nor  axe, 
nor  any  tool  of  iron  heard  in  the  house  while  it  was 


IS   BEING   DONE  319 

in  huilding.^'  Here,  "when  it  was  in  building  "  is  re- 
presented in  the  Septuagint  version  by  iv  tw  (u/coSo/aci- 
o-Oai  auTov  (the  infinitive  passive),  and  in  the  Vulgate 
by  '"''cum  aidificaretur''' — again  the  imperfect  sub- 
junctive passive.  The  German  translation  gives  in 
the  first  instance,  "  da  man  die  arcJui  zuriistete,'^  when 
they  prepared  or  fitted  out  the  ark ;  in  the  second, 
"  und  da  das  haus  gesetztward,^^  and  when  the  house 
was  founded  ;  at  the  end  of  the  verse,  "  in  building  " 
of  the  English  version  has  its  exact  counterpart  in 
"  im  haueny  The  French  version  gives,  in  the  first 
instance,  '■'■  jjendant  que  Varche  se  batissoit,'"  which, 
according  to  the  French  idiom,  is,  while  the  ark  was 
built ;  and  in  the  second  instance,  both  at  the  begin- 
ning and  the  end  of  the  verse,  en  hutissant  la  maisoyi, 
that  is,  in  building  the  house.  In  the  Italian  version 
we  find,  in  one  passage,  "  quando  la  casafu  edificata,'^ 
which  is,  literally,  when  the  house  was  built ;  and 
"  mentre  s'  edvficava,^''  while  it  built  itself,  an  idiomatic 
form  for  while  it  was  built ;  and  in  the  other,  accord- 
ing to  the  same  idiom,  '■'•mentre  s'  a/pparecehiava 
V  areha^''  while  the  ark  was  prepared.  Now,  all  these 
versions  express  the  same  facts  completely,  not  only 
each  one  of  them  to  those  to  whom  the  respective 
languages  are  vernacular,  but  completely  to  every 
man  who  has  acquired  a  knowledge  of  all  these 
tongues  ;  and  in  all  of  them  we  find  either  the  verbal 
substantive  form,  was  in  hidlding^  was  a-preparing, 
was  preparing,  or  the  imperfect  verbal  form,  was 
built,  was  prepared.  In  no  one  of  them,  not  even  in 
the  Greek  with  its  present  passive  participle,  is  there 
an  approach  to  such  a  phraseology  as  is  being  done, 
is  being  built,  which  in  Latin,  for  instance,  could  be 
represented  only  by  the  use  of  the  obsolete  participle 


320  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

present  ens,  and  the  monstrous  construction  ens /c^c^ws 
est,  ens  oedificatus  est. 

In  the  form  is  a-doing,  is  a-maTcing,  the  a  is  a  mere 
degraded  form  of  on  or  in  ;  as  in  ten  o'clock,  o'  repre- 
sents of  the.  Such  words  as  doing  and  making  are 
both  participles  and  verbal  nouns.  When  we  say,  I 
am  doing  thus,  I  am  making  this,  they  are  real  parti- 
ciples. When  we  say,  It  was  long  in  the  doing.  It  was 
slow  in  the  making,  they  are  verbal  nouns.  For  exam- 
j)le,  iu  the  following  passage  from  Ascham's  "  School- 
master," it  is  plain  that  weeping,  learning,  and  mis' 
liking  are  nouns  no  less  than  grief,  trouble,  and 
fear :  — 

"  And  when  I  am  called  from  him  I  fall  on  weeping,  because 
whatever  I  do  else  but  learning  is  full  of  grief,  trouble,  and  fear, 
and  whole  misliking  unto  me." 

So  in  the  following  passage  from  Barrow  (^Sermon 
XIII.),  on  going,  which  we  nowadays  cut  down  into 
a-going,  is  as  much  a  noun  as  rest  is  in  "  put  at 
rest :  "  — 

"  Speech  is  indeed  the  rudder  that  steereth  human  affairs,  the 
spring  that  setteth  the  wheels  of  action  on  going." 

In  the  Anglo-Saxon,  the  participle  and  the  verbal 
noun  were  distinguished  in  sense  and  in  form ;  the 
participle  ending  in  ende,  the  verbal  noun  in  ung.  In 
the  lapse  of  time,  and  by  the  simiDlifyiug  process  which 
I  have  before  mentioned,  these  two  terminations  were 
blended  in  the  form  ing,  which  represents  them  both. 
Hence  has  arisen  the  difficulty  of  those  precise  people 
who  were  content  to  speak  their  mother  tongue  as 
they  learned  it  from  their  mothers,  and  who  under- 
took, not  only  to  criticise,  but  to  take  to  pieces  and  put 
together  in  a  new  shape,  something  the  structure  of 


IS  BEING  DONE  321 

which  they  did  not  understand.  If,  in  their  trouble 
about  the  active  present  participle,  they  had  looked 
into  Ben  Jonson's  Grammar  (for  he,  like  Milton,  was 
a  scholar  as  well  as  a  poet,  and  wrote  an  English 
grammar,  as  jSlilton  wrote  a  Latin  accidence),  they 
would  have  seen  that  he  said  that,  "  Before  the  parti- 
ciple present,  «,  en  have  the  force  of  a  gerund  ; "  and 
a  gerund,  they  might  have  learned,  was  a  Latin  verbal 
noun  (taking  its  name  from  gero,  I  bear,  I  carry  on), 
used  to  express  the  meaning  of  the  present  infinitive 
active,  under  certain  circumstances.  Jonson  cites,  in 
illustration  of  his  law,  this  line  from  Norton,  "But 
there  is  some  grand  tempest  a-hrewing  towards  us," 
which  they  would  have  done  well  to  consider  before 
making  their  improvement ;  for  I  think  that,  even  now, 
one  of  their  sort  would  hesitate  to  look  up  into  a  low- 
ering sk}^,  and  say.  There  is  a  storm  being  brewed. 
He  would  be  laughed  at  by  any  sensible  Cape  Cod 
fisherman  or  English  countess.  To  this  day  we  say, 
—  every  man  and  boy  of  us  who  is  not  fitter  for  Bed- 
lam than  many  who  are  sent  there,  —  There  is  a  storm 
a-brewing,  as  our  forefathers  have  said  for  centuries. 
So,  in  "  The  Merchant  of  Venice  "  (Act  IL,  Scene  5), 
Shylock  says  to  Jessica,  — 

"  I  am  right  loath  to  go  : 
There  is  some  ill  a-bretving  toward  my  rest ; 
For  I  did  dream  of  money-bags  to-night." 

This  a,  which  represents  in,  is  said,  by  Mr.  Marsh, 
to  have  been  dropped  (by  writers,  I  suppose  he  means) 
about  the  beginning  of  the  eighteenth  century.  It 
might  better  not  have  been  dropped  at  all ;  but  it 
began  to  disappear  before  that  time.  AVitness  this 
passage  in  Cotton's  translation  of  Montaigne's  Es- 
says, a  masterpiece  of  idiomatic  English,  which  was 
produced  about  the  year  1G70  :  — 


322  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

"  A  slave  of  his,  a  vicious  ill-conditioned  fellow,  but  that  had 
the  precepts  of  philosophy  often  ringing  in  his  ears,  having,  for 
some  offence  of  his,  been  stript,  by  Plutarch's  command,  whilst 
he  vias  whipping  muttered  at  first  that  he  did  not  deserve  it,  etc., 
etc."  — Book  II.  "  Of  Anger." 

That  the  suppression  o£  the  a  is  a  loss  will  be  clear, 
from  consideration  of  this  example.  It  is  undeniable, 
that  the  phrase  "  whilst  he  was  whipping  "  might  be 
misunderstood  as  meaning,  while  the  he  was  whipping 
a  him.  Its  meaning  is  determined  only  by  the  context. 
But  so  is  the  meaning  of  nearly  half  the  words  in  any 
sentence.  If,  however.  Cotton  had  written  "  whilst 
he  was  a- whipping,"  there  would  be  no  opportunity 
for  the  mistaking  of  the  verbal  noun  whipping  for  the 
present  participle  whipping.  The  distinction  between 
these  two  intimately  related  parts  of  speech  may  be 
clearly  exemplified  by  the  following  sentence :  Plu- 
tarch was  whipping  a  slave,  and  while  the  slave  was 
a-whipping  he  told  his  master  that,  in  this  whipping, 
he  set  at  nought  his  own  moral  principles.  Here  no 
one  can  fail  to  see  at  once  that  the  first  whipping 
is  a  participle,  and  that  the  last  is  a  noun  ;  and  a  mo- 
ment's consideration  will  reveal  to  any  intelligent  per- 
son that  the  second  whi2')ping  is  also  not  a  participle, 
but  a  verbal  noun.  If  the  a  in  "  a-whipping "  were 
the  article,  that  would  decide  the  question ;  for  the 
article,  definite  or  indefinite,  can  be  used  only  with  a 
substantive.  This  is  illustrated  even  by  the  phrase  "  a 
go,"  which  is  sometimes  heard  ;  for,  when  a  gentle- 
man remarks,  "  Here  is  a  rum  go,"  without  meaning 
any  allusion  to  spirituous  liquors,  or  if,  with  such  allu- 
sion, speaks  of  "  a  go  of  gin,"  the  anguish  that  he 
inflicts  upon  the  well-regulated  grammatical  mind  is 
caused  merely  by  his  placing  the  first  person  present 


IS   BEING   DONE  323 

indicative  of  the  verb  to  go  in  the  relation  in  which 
it  can  be  properly  parsed  only  as  a  noun.  But  the  a 
in  the  phrases,  While  the  slave  was  a-whipping,  AVhilo 
the  house  was  a-building,  While  the  thing  was  a-doing, 
is  not  the  article,  as  I  have  said  before,  but  a  mere 
corruption  of  in  or  ow,  the  change  of  which  to  a  was 
caused,  clearly,  by  that  lazy  cai'elessness  of  speech 
that  tends  so  much  to  the  phonetic  degradation  of 
language.  Either  on  or  in,  however,  determines  the 
substantive  character  of  the  words  to  which  it  applies. 
As,  for  example,  if  the  gentleman  just  referred  to 
speaks  of  "  going  on  a  bust,"  the  preposition,  no  less 
than  the  article,  shows  that  he  is  so  reprobate,  so  lost 
to  Murray  and  to  Moon,  as  to  treat  the  verb  hurst  a3 
if  it  were  a  noun  ;  and  his  omission  of  the  r  from  the 
perverted  word  is  not  only  a  striking  instance  of  the 
addition  of  insult  to  injury,  but  a  warning  example 
of  the  phonetic  degradation  of  language,  and  of  man. 
The  nature  of  this  noun  of  action,  and  of  the  sim- 
ple, strong  construction  which  it  admits,  is  finely 
shown  in  this  pregnant  passage  from  Hobbes  ("  De 
Corpore  Politico,"  Part  II.,  chap.  2)  :  — 

"  In  the  making  of  a  Democracy  there  passeth  no  covenant 
between  the  sovereign  and  any  subject  ;  for,  while  the  Demo- 
cracy is  a-making,  there  is  no  sovereign  with  whom  to  contract." 

Here  the  word  mahing  is,  in  both  instances,  the 
same  part  of  speech,  the  representative  of  the  same 
idea,  and  in  the  same  relation  ;  and  the  writer  who 
would  change  the  latter  to.  While  the  Democracy  is 
being  made,  must  also,  that  his  language  may  not  be 
at  variance  with  itself  in  one  sentence,  change  the 
former,  and  read.  In  the  being  made  of  a  democracy, 
or,  what  is  the  same  thing.  In  a  democracy's  being 
made. 


324  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

Tlie  latter  course  of  this  idiom  of  in,  on,  or  a  with 
the  verbal  noun  may  be  traced,  and  the  period  of  the 
concoction  of  is  being  may  be  approximated  by  a 
comparison  of  the  heading  of  chapter  xxii.  of  "  Don 
Quixote,"  as  it  appears  in  the  principal  English  trans- 
lations.    The  original  is  as  follows  :  — 

"  De  la  liberdad  que  did  don  Quixote  i.  muchos  desdichados 
que  Dial  de  su  grado  los  llevabau  donde  no  quisieran  yr." 

Shelton,  in  1612,  rendered  it  thus  :  "  Of  the  liberty 
Don  Quixote  gave  to  many  wretches  who  were  a-carry- 
ing  perforce  to  a  place  they  desired  not."  Motteux, 
A.  D.  1719,  gives,  "  How  Don  Quixote  set  free  many 
miserable  creatures  who  were  carrying,  much  against 
their  will,  to  a  place  they  did  not  like."  Jarvis,  whose 
translation  was  published  in  1742,  has  it  thus  :  "  How 
Don  Quixote  set  at  liberty  several  unfortunate  per- 
sons who  were  carrying  much  against  their  wills  where' 
they  had  no  wish  to  go."  But  in  the  edition  of  Jar- 
vis's  translation  published  A.  D.  1818  "  carrying  "  is 
changed  to  "  being  carried." 

This  change  indicates  the  latter  part  of  the  seven- 
teenth century  as  the  birth-time  of  is  being.  And  in 
fact  the  earliest  known  instance  of  its  use  occurs  in  a 
letter  by  Southey  dated  1795.  Coleridge  used  it,  and 
Lamb,  and  Landor  ;  yet  after  three-quarters  of  a  cen- 
tury it  is  pronounced  a  novelty  and  a  nuisance.  It 
made  no  little  stir  when  it  was  first  brought  here, 
and  it  was  adopted  at  once  by  many  people  —  of 
course  those  who  wished  to  be  elegant.  I  have  heard 
of  an  instance  of  its  use,  after  it  had  become  in  vogue 
among  such  people,  which  illustrates  one  of  the  objec- 
tions to  which  it  is  obnoxious  —  that  it  represents  an 
act  as  going  on  (is  being^   and  as  completed  (done') 


IS  BEING  DONE  325 

at  the  same  time.  A  gentleman  called  early  in  the 
evening  at  a  house  with  the  ladies  of  which  he  was 
intimate.  The  door  was  opened  by  a  negress,  a  bright, 
pompous  wench,  in  one  of  the  Madras  kerchief  head- 
dresses commonly  worn  at  that  time  by  such  women. 
She  needed  not  to  wait  for  his  inquiry  for  the  ladies, 
but  welcomed  him  at  once  ;  for  he  was  a  favored  guest. 
"  Good  evenin',  sar !  Walk  in,  sar.  De  ladies  bcin' 
done  gone  to  de  uproar."  "  Gone  to  the  opera !  Thank 
you,  I  won't  come  in.  I  '11  see  them  there."  "  No, 
sar,  I  did  n't  say  dey  done  gone  to  de  uproar,  but," 
with  a  slight  toss  of  the  Madras  kerchief  and  a  smile 
of  superior  intelligence,  "  dey  bei/i  done  gone.  Walk 
in,  sar.  Ole  missus  in  de  parlor ;  young  missus  be 
down  stairs  d'recly."  My  grandmother  told  me  that 
story,  which  she  heard  from  the  gentleman  himself,  in 
my  boyhood,  neither  of  us  thinking  that  it  would  be 
thus  used  to  expose  the  absurd  affectation  in  speech  at 
which  she  laughed.  From  the  negress's  point  of  view, 
—  that  is,  the  "  done  gone  "  point,  —  she  was  as  right  in 
her  "  bein'  done  gone  "  as  those  whose  speech  she  aped 
were  in  their  "  is  being  done,"  and  "  is  being  built."  To 
her,  done  gone  expressed  a  going  that  was  finished,  a 
completed  going.  But  the  ladies  were  in  process  of  go- 
ing, not  going  or  "gwine  ;  "  that  would  have  expressed 
an  act  too  much  in  the  future  according  to  the  new  light 
she  had  seen  cast  upon  language  ;  and  so  she  boldly 
dashed  at  her  continuing  present  of  a  completed  ac- 
tion —  "  bein'  done  gone."  She  was  more  nearly  right 
in  her  practice  than  some  learned  linguists  are  in  their 
theory.  For  the  phrase  under  consideration  is  not  a 
"  continuing  present  of  the  passive  voice."  The  par- 
ticiples do7ie,  built,  etc.,  are  not  passive,  but  merely 
perfect  participles,  as  we  have  seen  before ;  and  being 


326  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

is  merely  a  present  participle.  The  union  of  the  two, 
therefore,  cannot  expi*ess  an  existing  and  continuing 
passivity  ;  it  merely  brings  preposterously  together 
the  ideas  of  the  present  and  the  past. 

The  combination  of  do  and  go  by  the  mean  whites 
and  the  negroes  of  the  South,  chiefly  in  the  forms 
done  gone  and  gone  done,  is  not  wholly  illogical  and 
absurd;  nor  is  it  without  respectable  precedent  in 
English  literature.  Witness  these  passages  from 
Chaucer :  — 

"  That  ye  unto  your  sonne  as  trewly 
Done  her  been  wedded  at  your  home  coining  ; 
This  is  the  final  end  of  all  this  thing." 

Legend  of  Good  Women,  1.  2096. 

"  And  I  woU  geve  him  all  that  f ala 
To  his  chamber  and  to  his  hals  ; 
I  woll  do  paint  with  pure  gold 
And  tapite  hem  full  manifold." 

The  Duchess,  1.  257. 

"  Bid  him  creepe  into  the  body 
And  do  it  gone  to  Alcione, 
The  queene,  there  she  lieth  alone." 

Ibid.,  1.  146. 

And  indeed  the  Southern  provincial  use  of  do  and  go 
is  capable  of  formulation  into  tenses,  which,  if  it  were 
not  for  the  prejudice  in  favor  of  other  —  in  the  pre- 
sent delicate  condition  of  the  country,  I  will  not  say 
better  —  usage,  might  claim  the  attention,  and  even 
the  adhesion,  of  people  like  those  who  adopt  is  being 
done  —  who  shun  an  idiom  as  they  would  be  thought 
to  shun  a  sin,  and  who  must  be  correct,  or  die.  For 
example  :  — 


IS  BEING  DONE 


327 


INDICATIVE   MOOD. 

PRESENT    AND    IMPEKFECT    TENSE. 

Singular.  Plural. 

1.  I  done,  1.  We  uns  done, 

2.  Yer  done,  2.  Yoii  uns  done, 

3.  He  done,  3.  They  uns  done. 


1.  I  gone  done, 

2.  Yer  gone  done, 

3.  He  gone  done. 


1.  We  uns  gone  done, 

2.  You  uns  gone  done, 

3.  They  uns  gone  done. 


PLUPERFECT. 


1.  I  done  gone  done, 

2.  Yer  done  gone  done, 

3.  He  done  gone  done. 


1.  I  gwine  done, 

2.  Yer  gwine  done, 

3.  He  gwine  done, 


1.  We  uns  done  gone  done, 

2.  You  uns  done  gone  done, 

3.  They  uns  done  gone  done. 

FUTURE. 

1.  We  uns  gwine  done, 

2.  You  uns  gwine  done, 

3.  They  uns  gwine  done. 


FUTURE   PERFECT. 


1.  I  gwine  gone  done, 

2.  Yer  gwine  gone  done, 

3.  He  gwine  gone  done, 


1.  We  uns  gwine  gone  done, 

2.  You  uns  gwine  gone  done, 

3.  Tliey  uns  gwine  gone  done. 


Cceiera  desunt. 

Here,  I  submit,  is  as  regular  and  symmetrical  a 
form  of  conjugation  as  can  be  found  in  any  English 
grammar.  In  some  respects  it  is  more  so.  For  in- 
stance, the  ambiguity  of  the  singular  you  and  the 
plural  yoii  is  obviated  by  the  use  of  yer  for  the  second 
person  singular,  and  you  uns  for  the  same  person  plu- 
ral. Of  these  two  persons,  on  this  system,  there  can 
be  no  confusion.  I  gwine  done  gone  is  as  reasonable 
a  part  of  the  verb  to  do  as  /  shall  or  will  have  done. 


328  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

But  the  full  absurdity  of  this  phrase,  the  essence  of 
its  nonsense,  seems  not  to  have  been  hitherto  pointed 
out.  The  objection  made  to  it  is,  that  it  unites  a  pre- 
sent with  a  "  passive,"  or  rather  a  perfect  participle. 
But  this  combination  is  of  frequent  occurrence,  and, 
of  itself,  is  quite  unobjectionable.  For  instance,  "  He, 
being  forewarned  of  the  danger,  fled."  And  there  is 
a  combination  of  the  same  participles  which  seems  yet 
nearer  in  meaning  to  the  one  under  consideration.  A 
lady  will  say  to  her  servant.  Why  can't  you  set  the 
table  thus,  or  so,  without  being  told  every  morning  ? 
That  is  good  sense  and  good  English.  In  Cotton's 
translation  of  Montaigne's  "  Apology  for  Raimond  de 
Sebonde  "  is  this  passage,  which  contains  a  like  con- 
struction :  "  There  is  more  understanding  required  in 
the  teaching  of  others  than  in  beiyig  taught."  Here 
we  have  also  sense  and  English  ;  and  that  being  ad- 
mitted, it  will  seem  to  some  persons  a  full  justifica- 
tion of  the  phrase,  "  while  the  boy  is  being  taught." 
It  is  not  so,  however.  Florio,  writing  nearly  a  hun- 
dred years  before  Cotton,  translates  the  same  passage 
thus :  "  More  discourse  is  required  to  teach  others 
than  to  be  taught,"  using  the  infinitive  in  both  parts 
of  the  sentence.  The  likeness  between  the  infinitive 
and  the  verbal  noun  is  so  close  that  the  latter  may 
almost  always  be  used  for  the  former,  although  the 
former  may  not  be  used  for  the  latter.  Montaigne 
used  the  verbal  noun  in  both  instances.  His  sentence 
has  merely  an  elision  of  the  article  before  the  last 
verbal  noun,  and  in  fvill  is,  "  There  is  more  understand- 
ing required  in  the  teaching  of  others  than  in  the  being 
taught."  This  elision  is  common,  and  appears  in  the 
lady's  question  to  her  servant,  which  in  full  is,  Why 
cannot  you  set  the  table  thus  without  [what  ?  some 
object^  — -  without  the  being  told  ? 


IS  BEING  DONE  329 

What,  then,  is  the  fatal  absurdity  in  this  phrase, 
which  has  been  so  long  and  so  widely  used  that,  to 
some  people,  it  seems  to  be  an  old  growth  of  the 
language,  while  it  is  yet  in  fact  a  mere  transplanted 
sucker,  without  life  and  without  root  ?  It  is  in  the 
combination  of  is  with  being  ;  in  the  making  of  the 
verb  to  be  a  complement,  or,  in  grammarians'  phrase, 
an  auxiliary  to  itself  —  an  absurdity  so  palpable,  so 
monstrous,  so  ridiculous,  that  it  should  need  only 
to  be  pointed  out  to  be  scouted.  To  be  —  called  by 
Latin  grammarians  the  substantive  verb  —  expresses 
mere  existence.  It  predicates  of  its  subject  either 
simple  absolute  existence  or  whatever  attribute  follows 
it.  To  be  and  to  exist,  if  not  perfect  synonyms,  are 
more  nearly  so,  perhaps,  than  any  two  verbs  in  the  lan- 
guage. In  some  of  their  meanings  there  is  a  shade 
of  difference,  but  in  others  there  is  none  whatever ; 
and  the  latter  are  those  which  serve  our  present  pur- 
pose. When  we  say.  He,  being  forewarned  of  dan- 
ger, fled,  we  say,  He,  existing  forewarned  of  danger, 
fled.  When  we  say  that  a  thing  is  done,  we  say  that 
it  exists  done.  When  we  say.  That  being  done  I  shall 
be  satisfied,  we  say.  That  existing  done  I  shall  be  sat- 
isfied. Is  being  done  is  simply  exists  existing  done. 
To  say,  therefore,  that  a  thing  is  being  done  is  not 
only  to  say  (in  respect  of  the  last  two  participles)  that 
a  process  is  going  on  and  is  finished,  at  the  same  time, 
but  (in  respect  of  the  whole  phrase)  that  it  exists 
existing  finished  ;  which  is  no  more  or  other  than  to 
say  that  it  exists  finished,  is  finished,  is  done ;  which 
is  exactly  what  those  who  use  the  phrase  do  not  mean. 
It  means  that  if  it  means  anything ;  but  in  fact  it 
means  nothing,  and  is  the  most  incongruous  combina- 
tion of  words  and  ideas  that  ever  attained  respectable 
u»a.8je  in  any  civilized  language. 


330  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

This  absurdity  is  cloaked  by  the  formation  of  to  he 
from  parts  of  three  verbs,  which  gives  us  such  dis- 
similar forms  as  is  for  the  present  tense,  was  for  the 
past,  and  being  for  the  present  participle.  It  seems 
as  if  in  is  being  there  were  two  verbs.  We  may  be 
sure  that  if  the  present  participle  of  to  be  were  formed 
like  that  of  to  love  (loving)  we  should  never  have 
heard  the  phrases  bes  being  done  or  is  ising  done, 
bes  being  built  or  is  ising  built.  This  nonsense  is 
hidden  from  the  eye  and  deadened  to  the  ear  by  the 
dissimilarity  in  form  of  is  and  being.  We  may  rightly 
use  to  have  as  a  complement  to  itself,  and  say  have 
had,  or  even  had  had,  because  we  can  have  having, 
possess  possession.  But  we  cannot  be  being,  exist  ex- 
istence. To  be  being  is  merely  to  be ;  nothing  more  or 
less.  It  is  being  is  simply  equal  to  it  is.  And  in  the 
supposed  corresponding  Latin  phrases  ens  f actus  est, 
cedijicatus  est  (the  obsoleteness  of  ens  as  a  participle 
ens  being  granted),  the  monstrosity  is  not  in  the  use  of 
ens  with  factus,  but  in  that  of  ens  with  est.  The 
absurdity  is  in  Latin  just  what  it  is  in  English,  the 
use  of  is  with  being,  the  making  of  the  verb  to  be  a 
complement  to  itself. 

But  it  is  strongly  urged,  and  speciously  maintained, 
that  to  be  and  to  exist  are  not  synonyms  when  the 
former  is  used  as  a  so-called  auxiliary  verb.  In  the 
words  of  one  critic,  "  The  verb  is,  as  a  copula  between 
a  subject  and  a  predicate,  is  no  synonym  with  the  verb 
exist.  It  does  not  affirm  the  existence  of  either  sub- 
ject or  predicate.  It  is  simply  the  sign  of  connec- 
tion, the  coupler,  directing  the  reader  to  think  subject 
and  predicate  in  unity." 

That  there  is  a  difference  between  the  signification 
of  a  verb  used  independently,  and  that  which  it  has 


IS   BEING   DONE  331 

as  a  so-called  auxiliary,  seems  to  me,  with  my  present 
light,  a  mere  fiction  of  the  grammarians,  whose  rules 
are,  in  my  judgment,  valuable  only  in  those  rare  in- 
stances in  which  they  conform  to  reason  and  common 
sense,  in  behalf  of  which  I  have  dared  to  do  battle. 

This  very  notion  that  the  verb  is  a  copula,  fulfilling 
the  functions  of  a  coupler  in  a  sentence,  is  one  of 
those  against  which,  in  boyhood,  I  beat  my  apprehen- 
sive head  in  vain.  Now,  apprehending  it,  I  believe  it 
to  be  the  merest  linguistic  fiction  with  which  man  ever 
was  deluded.  The  verb  is  the  life  of  the  sentence. 
A  sentence  is  an  assertion,  direct  or  hypothetical ; 
and  it  is  the  verb,  and  the  verb  only,  which  asserts. 
Assertion  is  its  peculiar  and  exclusive  characteristic. 
True,  in  asserting  it  does  connect  subject  and  predi- 
cate ;  but  this  is  an  incidental,  and  we  might  almost 
say  an  unessential,  function  of  the  verb,  whose  office 
is  to  move  the  sentence,  to  be  the  engine  that  propels 
the  train  of  thought,  and  not  the  coupling  that  keeps 
it  together. 

The  substantive  verb  to  he  expresses  existence  ;  and 
whether  used  by  itself  or  in  connection  with  a  parti- 
ciple or  an  adjective,  it  does  nothing  more.  But 
existence  may  be  simple  and  absolute,  or  it  may  be 
modified  by  the  relations  of  its  subject  to  some  condi- 
tion or  quality.  In  the  sentence  "  Socrates  is,"  sim- 
ple existence  is  predicated  of  Socrates  ;  but  in  this, 
"  Socrates  speaks,"  a  certain  act,  that  is,  existence 
together  with  a  certain  condition  of  existence,  is  pre- 
dicated of  him.  For  it  is  as  true  now  as  it  was  when 
Aristotle  said  it,  as  true  of  English  as  of  Greek,  that 
the  assertion  "  Socrates  speaks  "  is  equivalent  to  the 
assertion  "  Socrates  is  speaking."  Now,  it  seems  to 
me  clear  that  the  difference  between  "  Socrates  is " 


332  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

and  "  Socrates  is  speaking  "  is  merely  that  the  former 
predicates  simple  existence  of  Socrates,  and  the  latter, 
existence  and  something  more.  The  participle  speah- 
ing  modifies,  both  by  limitation  and  expansion,  the 
assertion  of  the  verb  is.  "  Socrates  is  speaking  "  is 
equivalent  to  "  Socrates  exists  speaking."  So  when 
we  say  that  a  man  is  loved,  is  hated,  is  condemned,  we 
say  merely  that  the  loved,  hated,  or  condemned  condi- 
tion is  that  in  which  he  exists.  And  even  the  sen- 
tence "the  man  is  dead  "  is  equivalent,  neither  more 
nor  less,  to  the  other,  "  the  man  exists  dead."  If  the 
last  example  should  provoke,  even  in  those  who  accept 
its  predecessors,  a  smiling  doubt,  and  a  suspicion  that 
this  example  is  fatal  to  my  view  of  the  meaning  of 
to  be,  it  must  be  by  reason  of  a  misapprehension  of 
the  meaning  of  the  verb  exist  as  it  is  used  in  this 
construction.  If  exist  must  mean  literally  is  alive, 
and  nothing  else,  we  cannot  accept  the  sentence  "  the 
man  exists  (is  alive)  dead,"  as  the  equivalent  of  "the 
man  is  dead."  But  an  objection  resting  upon  this 
assumed  ambiguity  can  be  quickly  set  aside.  The 
existence  predicated  by  the  substantive  verb  to  he  is 
not  necessarily  one  of  life,  but  one  that  is  predicable 
alike  of  things  animate  and  inanimate.  We  say  that 
a  planet,  a  country,  a  town  exists,  or  that  it  does  not 
exist,  i.  e.,  that  it  is,  or  is  not ;  as  Virgil  made  ^Eneas 
%?ijfuit  Ilium,  or  as  we  might  say,  using  the  verb  to 
he  in  two  tenses  to  express  the  same  fact.  The  man 
was,  and  is  not ;  in  which  sentence  was  predicates  an 
existence  past,  and  is  not,  a  negative  existence  present ; 
a  negative  existence  being  no  more  a  contradiction  in 
terms  than  a  negative  affirmation.  So  when  we  say, 
The  man  is  dead,  we  merely  predicate  of  him  a  dead 
existence,  which  so  far  as  he  is  concerned  is  no  exist- 


IS  BEING  DONE  333 

ence  at  all  in  this  world,  as  far  as  we  know  ;  but  so 
far  as  we  are  concerned  with  him  as  the  subject  of 
speech,  is  a  mere  change  in  the  condition  of  his  exist- 
ence. With  a  ruined  city  or  a  dead  man  before  us, 
the  existence  of  either  palpable,  though  changed  in  its 
condition,  we  say.  The  city  exists  no  more,  or.  The  city 
is  (exists)  ruined.  The  man  exists  no  more,  or,  The 
man  is  (exists)  dead.  To  this  sense  of  the  word  exist, 
life  is  not  more  essential  in  the  one  case  than  in  the 
other.  This  construing  may  easily  be  ridiculed,  but 
I  am  quite  sure  that  it  will  outlive  any  ridicule  that 
it  may  provoke,  and  that  it  affords  the  only  reason- 
able explanation  of  the  intimate  signification  of  such 
phrases  as  those  which  have  just  been  given  in  illus- 
tration. 

Home  Tooke,  as  if  to  leave  an  example  not  to  be 
set  aside  of  the  identity  of  is  and  exist,  wrote  the  fol- 
lowing remarkable  sentence  in  his  dialogue  "  Of  Pre- 
positions." B.  asks  whether  good-breeding  or  policy 
dictated  a  certain  sharp  criticism  upon  Dr.  Johnson 
and  Bishop  Lowth.     H.  replies,  — 

"  Neither.  But  a  quality  which  passes  for  brutality  and  ill 
nature  ;  and  which,  in  spite  of  hard  blows  and  heavy  burdens, 
would  make  nie  rather  chuse  in  the  scale  of  beings  to  exist  a 
mastifi  or  a  mide  than  a  monkey  or  a  lap-dog."  —  Div.  of  Pur., 
I.  370,  ed.  1798. 

Now,  can  any  man  who  has  preserved  all  his  senses 
doubt  for  a  moment  that  "  to  exist  a  mastiff  or  a 
mule  "  is  absolutely  the  same  as  "  to  be  a  mastiff  or  a 
mule  "  ?  And  can  such  a  person  believe  that  in  the 
phrases,  to  be  a  mule,  to  be  stubborn,  and  to  be  beaten, 
there  is  the  least  shade  of  difference  in  the  meaning 
of  the  verb  to  be  ?  that  it  has  one  meaning  when  it  is 
followed  by  the  noun,  mwZe,  and  the  same  when  it  is 


334  WORDS  AND   THEIR    USES 

followed  by  the  adjective,  stubborn,  but  another  when 
it  is  followed  by  the  participle,  beaten,  which  is  but  a 
kind  of  adjective  ?  If  there  is  such  a  difference,  then 
the  verb  must  have  the  former  meaning  before  the 
adjective  afraid  in  the  sentence,  He  is  afraid.  But 
afraid  is  merely  the  perfect  jDarticiple  of  the  verb 
affray  —  affrayed,  afrayed,  the  same  as  the  old  parti- 
ciple af eared,  from  the  Anglo-Saxon  afaeran  ;  a,nd 
how  and  when  did  the  verb  to  be  change  its  meaning 
by  the  mere  contraction  of  affrayed  into  afraid  f 

But  it  is  said  the  use  of  is  with  being  involves  no 
absurdity,  because  here  being  does  not  mean  existing, 
but  continuing.  In  illustration  of  which,  the  phrase, 
The  anvil  is  being  struck  is  given.  That,  we  are 
told,  is  equivalent  to,  The  anvil  is  continuing  struck. 
"  Being  struck  implies  a  process,  a  continuity  of  some 
sort  beyond  a  simple  instant.  Is  affirms  the  being 
struck  of  the  anvil."  Let  us  examine  that  position, 
and  see  if  it  relieves  us  of  confusion  and  ambiguity. 
Keeping  to  Noah's  ark,  let  us  say,  The  ark  being  fin- 
ished, the  hippopotamus  declined  entering  it.  Does 
that  mean,  the  ark  continuing  finished,  etc.?  The 
bond  being  given,  Shylock  lent  the  money.  Does  that 
mean  the  bond  continuing  given,  etc.?  Plainly  it  does 
not,  cannot  mean,  in  either  case,  that,  or  anything  like 
that.  We  find  ourselves  landed  in  the  confusion  and 
the  ambiguity  of  assuming  that  in,  "•  The  ark  being 
prepared,"  being  has  one  meaning,  and  in,  "  The  ark 
is  being  prepared,"  another.  But  if  we  hold  to  reason, 
and  regard  being  as  always  meaning  existing,  and^re- 
paring,  building,  as  verbal  substantives  that  mean  a 
•process,  we  have  no  confusion,  neither  ambiguity  nor 
absurdity.  The  ark  being  prepared,  means  the  ark 
existing  prepared ;  and,  While  the  ark  was  in  pre- 


IS  BEING   DONE  335 

paring,  or  was  preparing,  means  while  the  ark  was  in 
process  of  preparation.  Is  there  a  man  of  sense  who 
can  speak  English,  who  does  not  understand,  In  the 
hidlding  of  the  house^  to  mean,  in  the  process  of  the 
erection  of  the  house  ?  It  is  safe  to  say,  not  one.  The 
verbal  substantive  in  Ing^  or,  if  you  please,  the  present 
participle  used  substantively,  expresses,  to  the  appre- 
hension of  all  men,  a  process.  And  such  phrases  as 
being  huilt,  being  done,  must  be  used  absolutely,  in  a 
participial  sense,  as.  The  house  being  built,  he  went 
into  it ;  The  thing  being  done,  it  could  not  be  helped, 
or  they  must  be  used  substantively.  For  example,  the 
following  passage  from  the  first  book  of  Young's 
"  Night  Thoughts :  "  — 

"  Of  man's  miraculous  mistakes  this  bears 
The  palm  :   That  all  men  are  about  to  live, 
Forever  on  the  brink  of  being  born." 

Here  being  born  is  a  substantive,  equivalent  to  birth, 
as  much  a  substantive  as  any  single  word  in  any  lan- 
guage.    Which  may  be  shown  thus  :  — 

an  abyss. 

Forever  on  the  brink  of  <  ,    .  ' 

being  born. 

,  birth. 

We  can  say,  His  being  born  at  that  time  was  fortu- 
nate, as  well  as.  His  birth  at  that  time  was  fortunate. 
But,  to  meet  the  last  and  most  specious  suggestion 
which  has  been  made  in  favor  of  the  is-being  or  to- 
be-being  phraseology,  that  is  merely  predicates  of  its 
subject  the  being  and  the  following  participle  —  we 
cannot  say.  He  was  birth  ;  and  no  more  can  we  cor- 
rectly say.  He  was  being  born.  And  so  we  may  say, 
The  anvil's  being  struck  was  evident ;  in  which  being 
struck  means  the  blow  which  the  anvil  received,  and 


336  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

which  thus  is  ihe  anvil's  blow  ;  but  we  cannot  correctly 
(i.  e.,  logically,  in  accordance  with  reason  and  com- 
mon sense)  say,  The  anvil  was  being  struck,  any  more 
than  we  can  say.  The  anvil  was  blow.  If  we  wish  to 
say  that  the  anvil  is  in  the  continued  recipience  of 
blows,  and  do  not  wish  to  say  substantively.  The  anvil 
is  in  striking,  or  a  striking,  or  striking,  we  may  with 
perfect  propriety  and  clearness  of  expression  say.  The 
anvil  is  struck,  as  Hamlet  said  Polonius  "  is  eaten." 
Is  struck  does  not  mean  has  been  struck,  as  is  eaten 
does  not  mean  has  been  eaten :  both  express  present 
continuous  recipience  of  action. 

These  comparisons  and  this  reasoning  are  pertinent 
to  the  consideration  of  what  has  been  said  in  defence 
of  the  phrase  is  heing  do7ie,  because  that  phrase  is  not 
an  idiom  which  came  into  the  lansuasfe  in  its  uncon- 
scions  formative  stages,  but  the  deliberate  production 
of  some  pedantic  writer  of  the  last  generation,  who 
sought  to  make,  in  the  words  of  one  of  his  apologists, 
"  a  form  of  expression  which  should  accurately  repre- 
sent the  form  of  thought,"  that  thought  being  one 
which  has  been  fully  expressed  among  all  civilized 
peoples  for  thousands  of  years  ;  and  the  result  of  his 
labors  is,  as  might  have  been  expected,  a  monstrosity, 
the  illogical,  confusing,  inaccurate,  unidiomatic  charac- 
ter of  which  I  have  at  some  length,  but  yet  imperfectly, 
set  forth.  The  suggestion  has  been  made  that,  in  the 
phrase  under  examination,  is  means  becomes,  and  that 
the  house  is  heing  huilt  means,  the  house  is  becoming 
built.  Now,  if  any  man  chooses  to  say,  The  house  is 
becoming  built,  I,  for  one,  shall  make  no  objection 
other  than  that  he  is  setting  aside  a  healthy  and  suffi- 
cient idiom,  which  has  grown  up  naturally  with  the 
language,  and  is,  in  fact,  coeval  with  its  birth,  for  a 


IS  BEING  DONE  337 

new  phrase  which  has  nothing  of  force  or  of  accuracy 
in  its  favor.  But  that  is  does,  or  by  any  possibility 
can,  viean  becomes,  that  the  verb  of  existence,  the 
substantive  verb,  can  in  any  way  represent  or  be  re- 
presented by  another  verb,  the  radical  thought  in 
which  is  motion  toward,  entrance  into,  is,  I  confess, 
beyond  my  comprehension. 

The  question  is  thus  narrowed  simply  to  this :  Does 
to  he  being  (^esse  ens)  mean  anything  more  or  other 
than  to  he  ?  Does  it  so  mean  logically,  according  to 
the  common  sense  of  men,  and  the  spirit  and  analo- 
gies of  the  language  ?  For  as  to  what  it  may  be 
made  to  mean,  what  men  may  agree  to  accept  it  as 
meaning,  there  is  nothing  to  be  said.  Beef^  for  a  good 
reason,  means  the  flesh  of  the  ox,  and  steak.,  for  a 
like  reason,  flesh  in  large  slices ;  and  therefore  heef- 
steak  means  the  flesh  of  the  ox  in  large  slices.  But 
there  is  no  telling  whether  by  the  labors  of  those 
who  wish  to  "  slough  off "  old,  uncouth  forms,  and 
to  make  "  the  form  of  expression  accurately  represent 
the  form  of  thought,"  people  may  not  be  led  to  agree 
that  it  shall  mean  plum-jjudding. 

What  then  shoidd  we  do  ?  Should  we  say.  While 
the  boy  was  whipping,  The  room  was  sweeping,  The 
dinner  was  eating,  The  cow  was  milking.  The  meat  is 
cooking  ?  Yes  :  why  not  ?  Why  not,  as  well  as.  The 
bell  is  tolling.  The  grain  is  ripening.  The  bread  is 
baking?  Could  there  be  a  more  absurd  affectation 
than,  instead  of.  The  tea  has  been  drawing  five  min- 
utes, to  say,  The  tea  has  been  being  drawn  five  min- 
utes ?  Been  being  —  is  that  sense,  or  English  ?  — 
except  to  children,  who  say  that  the}^  have  been  being 
naughty,  thereby  saying  only  that  they  have  been 
naughty.     Yet  the  tea  draws   nothing,  it  is  drawn  j 


338  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

the  bread  bakes  nothing,  it  is  baked  ;  the  grain  ripens 
nothing,  it  is  ripened.  But  when  we  say  that.  The 
tea  is  drawing,  we  do  not  say  that  it  is  an  agent  draw- 
ing anything,  but  that  it  is  itself  in  drawing.  And  so 
with  regard  to  all  the  other  examples  given,  and  all 
possible  examples.  In  Goldsmith's  "  Citizen  o£  the 
World  "  (Letter  XXI.)  is  the  following  passage,  de- 
scriptive of  a  play :  — 

"  The  fifth  act  began,  and  a  busy  piece  it  was  ;  scenes  shift- 
ing, trumpets  sounding,  drums  beating,  mobs  hallooing,  carpets 
spreading,  guards  bustling  from  one  door  to  the  other  ;  gods, 
demons,  daggers,  rags,  and  ratsbane." 

Read  the  second  clause  of  the  sentence  according 
to  the  formula  is  being  done.  "  Scenes  being  shifted, 
ti'umpets  being  sounded,  drums  being  beaten,  mobs 
hallooing,  carpets  being  spread,"  and  so  forth.  By 
this  change  the  very  life  is  taken  out  of  the  subject. 
No  longer  a  busy  piece,  it  drags  its  wounded  and  halt- 
ing body  along,  and  dies  before  it  gets  to  rags  and 
ratsbane. 

If  precise  affectation  can  impose  upon  us  such  a 
phrase  as  is  being  done  for  is  doing.,  it  must  needs 
drive  all  idioms  kindred  to  the  latter  from  the  lan« 
guage.  Our  walking  sticks,  our  fishing  rods,  and  our 
fasting  days,  because  they  cannot  walk,  or  fish,  or  fast, 
must  be  changed  into  to-be-walked-with  sticks,  to-be- 
fished-with  rods,  and  to-be-fasted-on  days ;  and  our 
church-going  bells  must  become  for-to-church-go  bells, 
because  they  are  not  the  belles  that  go  to  church.  Such 
ruin  comes  of  laying  presumptuous  hands  upon  idioms, 
those  sacred  mysteries  of  language. 


CHAPTER  XII 

A   DESULTORY    DENUNCIATION    OF    ENGLISH 
DICTIONARIES  ^ 

A  DICTIONARY  is  an  explanatory  word  catalogue ; 
and  a  perfect  one  will  contain  the  entire  literary  and 
colloquial  vocabulary  of  a  language ;  that  is,  every 
simple  word,  and  every  compound  word  with  a  single 
and  peculiar  meaning,  having  the  authority  of  usage 
respectable  for  antiquity,  generality,  or  the  eminence 
of  the  user.  It  would  seem  that  such  a  catalogue  could 
be  certainly  made,  patient  research  and  a  not  very 
remarkable  degree  of  learning  being  the  only  requi- 
sites to  its  making.    But,  in  fact,  an  absolutely  perfect 

^  In  the  first  sentence  of  this  chapter  as  it  was  originally  pub- 
lished (in  the  Galaxy  for  May,  1869),  I  mentioned  that,  but 
a  sbort  time  before  the  writing  of  it,  I  had  heard,  for  the  first 
time,  of  Trench's  pamphlet.  On  Some  Deficiencies  in  our  English 
Dictionaries,  of  which  I  had  until  then  in  vain  sought  a  sight, 
either  as  a  buyer  or  a  borrower.  Since  tliat  time  —  owing  to 
the  kindness  of  one  of  the  proprietors  of  Brotherhead  &  Com- 
pany's Library  —  I  have  had  an  opportunity  of  reading  the 
dean's  criticism.  The  differences  between  my  reverend  prede- 
cessor's {jresentation  of  the  subject  and  my  own  arise  chiefly  from 
the  difference  of  the  ideals  we  each  had  in  mind.  His  diction- 
ary is  a  philological  history  of  the  language,  with  illustrative  ex- 
amples ;  mine,  a  hand-book  of  every-day  reference  for  the  gen- 
eral reader.  I  have  modified  none  of  my  opinions  since  reading 
Archbishop  Trench's  pamphlet  ;  but  I  have  obtained  the  advan- 
tage of  citing  his  judgment  in  support  of  my  own  on  several 
important  points. 


340  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

dictionary  of  any  living  language  does  not  exist,  and 
perhaps  will  never  exist,  for  the  reason  that  it  cannot 
be  produced. 

Bailey's  "  Universal  Etymological  English  Diction- 
ary "  was  the  first  worthy  attempt  at  the  making  of  a 
word-book  of  our  language  :  and  it  was  a  very  credit- 
able work  for  the  time  of  its  publication,  a.  d.  1726. 
For  those  who  care  to  do  more  about  language  than 
to  see  how  "  the  dictionary  "  says  a  word  should  be 
spelled,  or  what  it  means,  Bailey's  work  has  never 
been  entirely  superseded.  There  was  some  reason  that 
the  compiler  should  say  that  he  had  enriched  his  book 
with  "  several  thousand  English  words  and  phrases  in 
no  English  dictionary  before  extant ;  "  for  the  English 
dictionaries  that  preceded  his  were  so  small  and  defi- 
cient, that,  as  representations  of  the  vocabulary  of  our 
language,  they  were  of  little  worth.  But  the  boast- 
ing of  subsequent  dictionary-makers,  like  most  other 
boasting,  is  empty  and  ridiculous  in  proportion  to  the 
magnitude  of  its  pretensions.  When  we  are  told  that 
Webster's  Dictionary  contains  sixteen  thousand  words 
not  found  in  any  similar  preceding  work,  and  then 
that  the  Imperial  Dictionary  contains  fifteen  thousand 
words  more  than  Webster's,  and  yet  again  that  the 
Supplement  to  the  Imperial  Dictionary  contains  twenty 
thousand  words  more  than  the  body  of  the  work,  we 
might  well  believe  that  our  language  spawns  words  as 
herrings  spawn  eggs,  and  that  a  mere  catalogue  of  its 
component  j)arts  would  soon  fill  a  shelf  in  an  ordinary 
library,  were  it  not  that  when  we  come  to  examine  these 
additions  of  thousands  and  tens  of  thousands  of  words 
thus  set  forth  as  made  in  each  new  dictionary,  and  in 
each  new  edition  of  each  dictionary,  we  find  that  not 
one  in  a  hundred  of  the  added  words,  hardly  one  in  a 


ENGLISH   DICTIONARIES  341 

thousand,  is  really  a  before  uneatalogued  item  of  the 
English  vocabulary.  Our  estimate  of  the  worth  of  an 
addition  that  proceeds  by  columns  of  four  figures  is 
further  lowered  by  the  discovery  that  these  dictiona- 
ries, with  all  their  ponderous  bulk  and  verbal  multi- 
tudinousness,  do  not  fully  represent  the  English  of  lit- 
erature or  of  common  life  ;  that  they  give  no  aid  to  the 
reading  of  some  of  our  standard  authors  ;  that  while 
they  set  forth,  with  wearisome  superfluity  and  puerile 
iteration,  that  upon  which  every  one  who  has  sense 
and  knowledge  enough  to  use  a  dictionary  at  all,  needs 
no  information,  they  pass  by  as  obsolete,  or  vulgar,  or 
colloquial,  or  what  not,  that  upon  which  people  of  in 
telligence  and  education  do  need  instruction  from  tb 
special  students  of  language  ;  and  that,  while  they' 
spot  their  pages  with  foreign  words  and  phrases,  the 
use  of  which  by  some  writers  has  shown,  with  a  super- 
ficial knowledge  of  other  tongues,  a  profound  igno- 
rance of  their  own,  —  they  neglect  home-born  words 
that  have  been  in  use  since  English  was  written  or 
spoken. 

That  works  to  which  the  foregoing  objections  can 
be  justly  made  —  as  they  may  be,  in  a  greater  or  less 
degree,  to  every  existing  English  dictionary  —  can  have 
no  real  authority,  is  too  plain  to  need  insisting  upon  with 
much  particularity.  As  to  dictionaries  of  the  present 
day,  that  swell  every  few  years  by  the  thousand  items, 
the  presence  of  a  word  in  one  of  them  shows  merely 
that  its  compiler  has  found  that  word  in  some  diction- 
ary older  than  his  own,  or  in  some  not  low  and  inde- 
cent publication  of  the  day  ;  the  absence  of  a  word 
from  any  one  of  them  showing  merely  that  it  has  not 
been  thus  met  with  by  the  dictionary-maker.  Its  pre- 
sence or  its  absence  has  this  significance  and  no  more. 


342  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

Word-books  thus  compiled  have  the  value  which 
always  pertains  to  large  collections  of  things  of  one 
kind,  even  although  the  things  may  be  intrinsically 
and  individually  of  little  worth  ;  but  the  source  of  any 
authority  in  such  woi'd-collections  it  would  be  difficult 
to  discover.  Upon  the  proper  spelling,  pronuncia- 
tion, etymology,  and  definition  of  words,  a  dictionary 
might  be  made  to  which  high  and  almost  absolute 
authority  could  justly  be  awarded.  And  the  first  and 
the  second  of  these  points  are  determined,  with  a  very 
near  approximation  to  such  merit,  in  the  works  of 
Ogilvie,  Latham,  Richardson,  Worcester,  and  that 
which  is  strangely  enough  called  Webster's. 

With  one  exceistion.  Etymology  is  the  least  valuable 
element  in  the  making  of  a  dictionary,  as  it  is  of  in- 
terest only  to  those  who  wish  to  study  the  history  of 
language.  It  helps  no  man  in  his  use  of  the  word 
bishop  to  know  that  it  comes  from  two  Greek  words, 
epi,  meaning  upon,  and  scopos,  meaning  a  looker,  still 
less  to  be  told  into  what  forms  those  words  have 
passed  in  Spanish,  Arabic,  and  Persian.  Yet  it  is 
in  their  etymologies  that  our  dictionaries  have  shown 
most  improvement  during  the  last  twenty-five  years ; 
they  having  profited  in  this  respect  by  the  recent 
great  advancement  in  the  etymological  department  of 
philology.  The  etymologies  of  words  in  our  recently 
published  dictionaries,  although,  as  I  have  said  before, 
they  are  of  no  great  value  for  the  purposes  for  which 
dictionaries  are  consulted,  are  little  nests  (sometimes 
slightly  mare-ish)  of  curious  and  agreeable  informa- 
tion, and  afford  a  very  pleasant  and  instructive  pas- 
time to  those  who  have  the  opportunity  and  the  incli- 
nation to  look  into  them.  But  they  are  not  worth,  in 
a  dictionary,  all  the  labor  that  is  spent  on  them,  or  all 


ENGLISH  DICTIONARIES  343 

the  room  they  occupy.  The  noteworthy  spectacle  has 
lately  been  shown  of  the  casting  over  of  the  whole 
etymological  freight  of  a  well-known  dictionary,  and 
the  taking  on  board  of  another.  For  the  etymologi- 
cal part  of  the  last  edition  of  "  Webster's  American 
Dictionary,"  so  called.  Dr.  Mahn,  of  Berlin,  is  re- 
sponsible. When  it  was  truly  called  Webster's  Dic- 
tionary, it  was  in  this  respect  discreditable  to  scholar- 
ship in  this  country,  and  even  indicative  of  mental 
supineness  in  a  people  upon  whom  such  a  book  could 
be  imposed  as  having  authority.  And  now  that  it  is 
relieved  of  this  blemish,  it  is,  in  this  respect,  neither 
Webster's  Dictionary  nor  "  American,"  but  Mahn's 
and  German. 

Dictionaries  are  consulted  chiefly  for  their  defini-  ' 
tions ;  and  yet,  upon  this  point,  all  our  English  dic- 
tionaries are  more  or  less  misleading  and  confusing. 
And  they  are  so  in  a  great  measure  because  the  desire 
to  multiply  words  has  its  counterpart  in  the  desire  to 
multiply  definitions,  in  defiance  of  simple  common  _J 
sense.  Minuteness  of  division  and  variety  of  signifi- 
cation have  been  sought,  that  the  book  might  be  big, 
and  its  definitions  be  styled  copious.  They  have  been 
marshalled  one  after  the  other  in  single  file,  that  their 
array  might  be  the  more  imposing ;  and  to  increase 
the  impressiveness  of  the  spectacle,  they  are  solemnly 
numbered.  And  so,  at  last,  we  are  seriously  told  that, 
for  instance,  fall,  as  a  verb,  has  twenty-eight  meanings, 
and  as  a  noun  nineteen  —  all  as  well-defined  and  sev- 
eral as  the  two-and-seventy  stinks  that  Coleridge  found 
in  the  City  of  Cologne  —  besides  thirty-eight  which 
it  has  in  established  phrases  !  But  this  simple  word  is 
far  over-passed,  in  the  multitude  and  variety  of  the 
meanings  assigned  to  it,  by  another,  ruji,  which  would 


344  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

s^em  to  express  always  one  simple  thought,  as  clearly 
and  absolutely  as  is  possible  in  language.  We  are 
actually  told  that  run^  as  a  verb  transitive,,  has_fifty- 
six  distinct  meanings,  thirteen  as  a  verb  intransitive, 
and  fourteen  as  a  noun,~15esides  twenty-seven  in  cur- 
rent phrases.  To  each  one  of  these  a  special  para- 
graph is  given,  so  that  the  line  stretches  out  like  that 
of  Banquo's  progeny  in  the  witches'  cave  ;  and  by  the 
tenuity  of  its  sense,  it  vanishes  away  into  nothing,  like 
the  receding  figures  in  a  perspective  diagram.  Here 
are  some  of  these  definitions  of  fall,  as  they  are  given 
in  Webster's  Dictionary.     Of  the  verb,  — 

5.  To  die,  particularly  by  violence. 

6.  To  come  to  an  end  suddenly,  to  vanish,  to  perish. 

7.  To  be  degraded,  to  sink  into  disrepute,  etc.,  etc. 

8.  To  decline  in  power,  wealth,  or  glory,  to  sink  into  weakness, 
etc.,  etc. 

26.  To  sink,  to  languish,  to  become  feeble  or  faint. 

10.  To  sink,  to  be  lowered. 

11.  To  decrease,  to  be  diminished  in  weight  or  value. 

17.  To  happen,  to  befall,  to  come. 

18.  To  light  on,  to  come  by  chance. 

20.  To  come,  to  arrive. 

21.  To  come  unexpectedly. 

27.  To  be  brought  forth. 

28.  To  issue,  to  terminate. 

Of  the  noun,  — 

3.  Death,  destruction,  overthrow. 

4.  Ruin,  destruction. 

5.  Downfall,  degradation,  loss  of  greatness. 

6.  Declension  of  greatness,  power,  or  dominion. 

7.  Diminution,  decrease  of  price  or  value,  depreciation,  as  the 
fall  of  prices,  the  fall  of  rents,  the  fall  of  interest. 

8.  Declination  of  sound  [whatever  that  may  be],  a  sinking  of 
tone,  cadence,  as  the  fall  of  the  voice  at  the  close  of  a  sentence. 


ENGLISH  DICTIONARIES  315 

Of  run  we  find  tlie  following  among  the  fifty-six 
meanings  given  of  it  as  a  transitive  verb :  — 

3.  To  use  the  legs  in  moving,  to  step,  as  children  run  alone  or 
run  about. 

4.  To  move  in  a  hurry  —  The  priest  and  people  run  about. 
8.  To  contend  in  a  race,  as  men  and  horses  run  for  a  prize. 

13.  To  be  liquid  or  fluid. 

14.  To  be  fusible,  to  melt. 

15.  To  fuse  or  melt. 

18.  To  flow,  as  words,  language,  or  periods. 

21.  To  have  a  course  or  direction. 

24.  To  have  a  continued  tenor  or  course. 

29.  To  proceed  in  succession. 

31.  To  proceed  in  a  train  of  conduct. 

36.  To  extend,  to  lie  in  continued  length,  as  veins. 

37.  To  have  a  certain  direction  —  The  line  runs  east  and  west. 
46.  To  pass  or  fall  into  fault,  vice,  or  misfortune,  as  to  run  into 

vice,  to  run  into  mistakes. 

48.  To  have  a  general  tendency  —  Temperate  climates  run 
into  moderate  governments. 

51.  To  creep,  as  serpents  run  on  the  ground. 

52.  To  slide,  as  a  sled  or  sleigh  runs  on  the  ground. 

53.  To  dart,  to  shoot,  as  a  meteor  in  the  sky. 

54.  To  fly,  to  move  in  the  air,  as  the  clouds  run  from  N.  E.  to 
S.  W. 

Of  ntw,  the  noun,  we  have  these  among  other  dis- 
criminated meanings :  — 

2.  Course,  motion,  as  the  run  of  humor. 

3.  Flow,  as  a  run  of  verses  to  please  the  ear. 

4.  Course,  process,  continued  series,  as  the  run  of  events. 

Words  would  be  wasted  in  showing  the  absurdity 
of  a  system  of  definitions  which  gives  such  results  as 
this ;  which  not  only  sets  forth  mere  metaphorical 
uses  of  words  as  instances  of  their  use  in  different 
senses,  but  in  the  metaphorical  use  regards  the  ap- 
plication of  a  word  in  one  sense  to  two  objects  as  its 
use  in  two  senses ;  as,  for  instance,  to  fall,  to  die  by 


346  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

violence,  and,  also,  to  come  to  an  end  suddenly ;  rww, 
to  pass  or  fall  into  vice,  and,  also,  to  have  a  gen- 
eral tendency.  Let  the  reader,  who  wishes  to  see 
to  what  lengths  this  mania  for  copious  definition  can 
lead  those  upon  whom  it  seizes,  examine  the  words 
worJc,  turn,  free,  live,  life,  light,  ivood,  head,  mahe, 
lay,  hreah,  cast,  cut,  give,  go,  have,  heart,  heavy,  high, 
hold,  put,  raise,  serve,  set,  so,  stand,  take,  to,  and 
almost  any  other  such  simple  words  in  Webster's  Dic- 
tionary. Let  him  turn  to  Johnson's,  and  see  that 
wooden  is  defined  first  as  "  made  of  wood,"  and  next 
as  "  clumsy,  awkward,"  two  passages,  of  which  the 
following  is  one,  being  quoted  as  support  for  the  lat- 
ter definition :  — 

"  When  a  bold  man  is  out  of  countenance,  he  makes  a  very 
wooden  figure  on  't." 

But  wooden  does  not  here  mean  clumsy  or  awk- 
ward ;  it  only  suggests  clumsiness  and  awkwardness ; 
and  it  verily  has  that  suggestion  in  its  power,  because 
it  means  made  of  wood,  and  means,  and  can  mean,  no- 
thing else.  The  use  of  wooden  in  this  instance  brings 
vividly  to  mind  how  like  a  wooden  figure,  a  figure- 
head, a  man  appears  who  has  lost  his  self-possession. 
Its  very  value  as  an  epithet  consists  in  that  it  does 
not  mean  clumsy  and  awkward.  In  the  following 
passage  in  "  Robinson  Crusoe,"  Defoe  furnishes  an 
example  of  this  use  of  the  same  word  more  perti- 
nent than  either  of  the  two  which  have  been  cited  in 
dictionaries  :  — 

"  Well,  this  I  conquered  by  making  a  wooden  spade  :  .  .  .  but 
this  did  my  work  in  a  wooden  manner." 

A  wooden  spade  could,  of  course,  serve  Robinson 
Crusoe's  needs  only  in  a  wooden  manner  ;  but,  saying 


ENGLISH   DICTIONARIES  347 

this  in  the  person  of  his  hero,  Defoe  also  artfull}'  sug- 
gests the  chnnsy  insufficiency  of  liis  homely  tool  ;  and 
his  meaning  is  conveyed  conii)letely  and  impressively, 
because  it  is  suggested,  and  not  literally  told.  Defoe's 
use  of  this  word  is  here  worthy  of  Shakespeare  him- 
self, who  attains  many  of  his  happiest  reaches  of  lan- 
guage in  this  manner.  lie  makes,  in  "  The  Tempest," 
a  like  use  of  the  very  word  in  question,  when  Fer- 
nando, carrying  logs,  says,  — 

"  [I]  would  no  more  endure 
This  wooden  slavery  than  to  suffer 
The  flesh-fly  blow  my  mouth." 

Here  wooden  at  once  expresses  literally  the  object 
of  the  speaker's  labor,  and  suggests  its  dull  oppres- 
siveness ;  and  it  does  the  latter  at  the  will  of  the  poet, 
just  because  without  that  will  it  does  only  the  former. 

If  we  may  say  that  wooden  means  clumsy,  awk- 
ward, dull,  oppressive,  we  may  as  well  say  that  oak 
means  courage,  because  of  the  phrase  "  hearts  of  oak," 
or  that  gold  means  innocence,  because  we  speak  of 
"  the  age  of  gold,"  or  that  iron  means  hard  or  hard- 
ness, because  iron-hearted  is  used  in  the  sense  of 
hard-hearted,  unfeeling,  cruel. 

Webster  is  not  wholly  responsible  for  the  vicious 
system  of  definition  upon  which  he  labored  with  such 
conscientious  thoroughness.  This  system  originated 
with  Dr.  Johnson  ;  and  it  is  mere  justice  to  say  that, 
although  Webster  carried  it  to  an  extreme  which  is 
both  extravagant  and  injurious,  he  improved  upon  his 
model,  and  displayed  a  power  of  discrimination,  and 
an  ability  for  the  exact  expression  of  nice  distinctions, 
much  surpassing  that  of  "  the  great  lexicographer." 

Johnson's  Dictionary  was  not  only  a  work  of  great 
research  —  it  was  a  work   original  in  its  design  and 


348  WORDS   AXD   THEIR   USES 

its  execution  ;  and  it  is  the  model  of  the  great  Eng- 
lish dictionaries,  except  Richardson's,  that  have  since 
been  compiled.,  They  are  all  founded  upon  John- 
son's ;  but  his  was  founded  upon  no  other :  it  was 
the  result  of  a  critical  examination  of  a  range  of 
English  literature  wider  than  had  ever  before  been 
examined  by  one  man  for  any  purpose.  It  was  almost 
inevitable  that  a  dictionary  made  in  such  a  manner 
should,  with  its  great  merits,  have  all  the  faults  by 
which  those  merits  are  counterbalanced,  and  particu- 
larly this  one  of  superfluous,  over-subtle,  misleading 
definitions.  Johnson  undertook  to  jjresent  a  full  vo- 
cabulary of  the  language  gathered  from  the  writings 
of  its  principal  authors  in  all  departments  of  litera- 
ture, and  to  define  each  word  of  that  vocabulary 
according  to  the  various  senses  in  which  he  found 
it  used.  Considering  the  end  in  view,  the  method 
adopted  was  the  best,  if  not,  indeed,  the  only  one,  for 
its  attainment ;  and  the  labor  was  gigantic.  But  it 
was  hardly  avoidable  that,  in  compiling  and  defining  a 
vocabulary  in  this  manner,  the  various  applications 
of  words  used  by  various  authors  in  the  same  sense 
should  be  accepted  as  uses  of  those  words  in  differ- 
ent senses  ;  and  particularly  that  various  metaphori- 
cal applications  of  words  having  but  one  real  meaning 
should  be  discriminated  by  different  definitions.  The 
collection  of  passages  for  the  illustration  of  defini- 
tions would  naturally  lead  to  this  false  distinction 
of  significations.  And  as  to  the  remainder  of  his 
task,  Johnson,  although  a  scholar,  and  a  thinker  of  sin- 
gular clearness  and  force,  was  not  a  philologist,  even 
according  to  the  crude  and  rudimentary  philology  of 
his  day ;  nor  was  his  mind  so  constituted  as  to  fit  him 
for  the  quick  perception  of  analogies  and  the  patient 


ENGLISH   DICTIONARIES  349 

tracing  of  verbal  vestiges  hidden  by  the  drift  of  cen- 
turies, which  are  necessary  to  the  successful  prosecu- 
tion of  philological  inquiry.  The  consequence  was  that 
he  produced  a  work  that  was  at  once  very  convenient 
and  very  pernicious.  I  will  not  say,  with  him  who 
yet  remains  the  gi-eatcst  philologist  that  has  made  the 
English  language  his  peculiar  study,  Ilorne  Tooke, 
that  Johnson's  Dictionary  is  a  disgrace  to  the  English 
people  ;  but  there  seems  to  be  no  reason  for  disputing 
Tooke's  judgment,  that  Johnson's  system  was  unscien- 
tific and  vicious,  and  that  a  dictionary  ought  to  be 
made  of  a  very  different  kind  from  anything  ever  j-et 
attempted  anywhere.  ("  Diversions  of  Purley,"  i.  401.) 
Now,  all  that  has  since  been  done  in  the  making  of 
English  Dictionaries  is  merely  to  build  upon  Johnson's 
foundation,  and  to  work  on  his  plan  with  the  increased 
materials  and  the  larger  knowledge  provided  by  the 
development  of  the  language  and  by  the  investiga- 
tions of  modern  philology. 

In  one  respect,  the  makers  of  later  dictionaries  have 
followed,  to  a  monstrous  extreme,  a  fashion  set  by 
Johnson  —  that  of  introducing  compound  words  and 
words  formed  from  others  simple  and  well  known,  by 
the  addition  of  the  prefixes  dls,  un^  mis,  re,  etc.,  the 
meaning  and  force  of  which  ai-e  as  generally  vmderstood 
as  that  of  s  in  the  plural  and  in  the  possessive  case. 
The  catalogues  of  these  words,  with  which  our  diction- 
aries are  blown  up  into  a  bloated  emptiness  of  bulk,  are 
an  offence  to  the  common  sense  of  any  reader,  even  the 
humblest,  and  cause  him  to  pay  for  that  which  he  does 
not  need,  while  they  fill  five  times  the  room  that 
would  be  required  by  that  which  he  does  need.  Open 
almost  any  dictionary,  the  Imperial,  Webster's,  or 
Worcester's,  —  but  Webster's  is  the  most  superfluous 


350  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

and  obtrusive  in  this  respect,  because  it  carries  to  the 
furthest  extreme  the  vicious  plan  of  vocabulary-making 
and  definition  introduced  by  Johnson,  —  open  it  at 
random,  and  see  how  it  is  loaded  down  with  this  worth- 
less lumber.  Of  words  formed  by  joining  rnilh  and 
some  other  word  together,  there  are  twenty-two,  of 
which  number  are  milk-jMil^  milh-pan,  milh-porridge^ 
milh-score^  milk-white.  And  yet  milk-pimch,  milk- 
train,  and  milk-poultice  are  omitted !  Strmo  fur- 
nishes twelve  compound  words,  so  called,  of  which  are 
straw-color,  straw-colored  !  straw-crowned,  straw-cut- 
ter, straw-stuffed !  and  even  straw-hat !  Yet  in  vain 
will  Mai'gery  Daw  look  for  straw-bed,  or  Recorder 
Hackett  seek  the  word  straw-bail.  Of  words,  so  called, 
made  by  the  union  of  heart  with  another,  there  are 
actually  sixty-nine  paraded,  heart  itself  having  sixteen 
distinct  meanings  assigned  to  it  simply,  and  eleven 
in  established  phrases.  Among  these  comjjounded 
words  are  heart-ache,  heart-appalling,  heart-consum- 
ing, heart-corroding  (why  not  heart-destroying,  and 
heart  -  crushing  f),  heart  -  expanding,  heart  -  shaped 
(which  we  are  informed  means  "  having  the  shape  of 
a  heart "),  heart-piercing  (which  means  "  piercing  the 
heart  "),  heart-sick  (which  means  "  sick  at  heart  "), 
heart-thrilling,  heart-whole,  and  the  like  ;  and  yet 
heart-entrancing,  heart-enticing,  and  heart-bewitching, 
as  well  as  heart-blood,  are  omitted.  Why?  Gentle 
Webster,  tell  us  why  !  Surely  a  dictionary,  of  all 
things,  should  be  "  in  concatenation  accoixlingly." 

After  being  told  that  head,  simple  of  itself,  has 
thirty-one  distinct  meanings  (it  has  but  one  of  the 
thirty-one),  we  are  presented  with  it  in  combination 
with  other  simple  words  thirty-seven  times  ;  of  which 
manner  of  dictionary-making  here  are  a  few  exam- 


ENGLISH  DICTIONARIES  351 

pies :  head-ache  (which  the  enquirer  will  learn  means 
"  pain  in  the  head  "),  head-dress^  head-first  (which  we 
are  told  means  "  with  the  head  foremost. "  Why  not 
"  with  the  head  first "  ?  that  would  be  mdre  in  keep- 
ing), headless  (of  which  we  not  only  learn  that  it  means 
"  without  a  head,"  but  for  which  we  are  given  the  high 
authority  of  Spenser  as  warranting  us  to  say  a  head- 
less body,  neck,  or  carcass)  ;  head-strong,  head-worh, 
and  head-worJcman  also  appear.  We  find  sixty-seven 
compounds  of  horse,  such  as  horse-hreaker,  horse- 
dealer,  horse-flesh,  horse-jockey,  horse-lceeper,  horse- 
race, and  (important)  horse-racing,  horse-shoe,  horse- 
stealer, horse-thief,  and  horse-stealing,  horse-whij), 
horse-whijjped  :  and  horse-whipping  twice.  Why  were 
here  not  sixty-eight  compounds?  for  horse-marine, 
alas !  is  absent. 

Sea  is  repeated  in  combination  with  other  words 
one  hundred  and  fifty-seven  times  !  the  combined  words 
being  all  printed  at  full  length,  each  in  a  line  by  it- 
self, with  definitions  to  use  them  withal.  Else,  indeed, 
how  could  a  man,  after  being  told  what  sea  means, 
compass  the  meaning  of  sca-hanhed,  sea-bar,  sea- 
hathed,  sea-breeze,  sea-ca2>tain,  sea-coast,  sea-man,  sea- 
resembling  (which  means  "  like  the  sea  ")  ;  sea-shell, 
sea-sho7'e,  sea-side,  sea-thief,  sea-water,  or  sea-weed? 
And  yet,  in  defiance  of  Cooper  and  Marryatt,  and 
Admiral  Farragut  and  the  Navy  of  the  United  States 
being  set  at  naught,  sea-cook  is  not  to  be  found,  nor 
yet  sea-lubber.  Again  why  ?  Webster,  why  ?  for  you 
give  us  cook  and  give  us  lubber,  as  you  give  us  bank, 
and  breeze,  and  ca^towi,  andsAe//,  and  shore,  and  side, 
and  thief  and  water.  Why,  therefore,  sea-captain, 
and  not  sea-cook  f  why  sea-thief  and  not  sea-lubber  ? 
We  are  told  what  ear-deafening  means,  but  are  left  in 


352  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

ignorance  as  to  ear-stunning.  Tooth-drawer  is  deemed 
worthy  of  explanation,  but  tooth-filler  pines  in  neg- 
lect. Dining  having  been  defined,  and  room.,  we  are 
nevertheless  told  that  dining-room  is  a  room  to  dine 
in  ;  and  yet  we  are  heartlessly  left  to  our  own  resources 
to  discover  the  meaning  of  hreahfast-room,  hreakfast- 
time,  tea-room,  tea-time,  supper-room,  and  supper- 
time  ;  and  although  we  are  told  what  banquet  means, 
and  what  room,  and  also  (perhaps  therefore)  what  a 
hanqueting-room  is,  and  what  a  hall  is,  yet  as  to  what 
those  hanquet-halls  are,  visions  of  which  float  through 
the  stilly  night,  we  are  left  to  guess  from  the  poet's  con- 
text, or  to  evolve  from  the  depths  of  our  own  moral 
consciousness.  We  are  told  the  meaning  first  of 
apple,  and  then  gravely  informed  of  that  of  apple-har- 
vest, of  apple-john,  apple-pie,  apple-sauce,  apple-tart, 
and  even  of  apple-tree.  But  we  learn  nothing  about 
apple-butter,  apple-dumpling,  apple-pudding  and 
apple-slump,  as  to  two  of  which  information  is  more 
needed  than  of  any  other  compounds  of  apple,  the  only 
words  of  all  these  compounds  which  have  properly  a 
place  in  a  dictionary  being  apple-john,  apple-butter, 
and  apple-slump.  Thus,  and  properly,  we  have  cran- 
berry, but  we  do  not  find  cranberry-sauce ;  currant, 
but  not  currant-jelly  ;  strawberry,  but  not  strawberry- 
iced-cream,  or  strawberry-short-cake  ;  short-cahe  being 
a  good  example  of  the  sort  of  compound  word  that 
should  be  given  in  dictionaries.  Perhaps  the  most 
audacious  of  all  these  j)resentations  of  simple  words 
in  couples  as  words  with  individual  claims  to  places 
in  an  English  vocabulary,  is  the  array  in  which  self 
is  shown  in  conjunction  with  some  noun,  adjective,  or 
participle.  Of  these  there  are  actually  in  Webster's 
Dictionary  one  hundred  and  ninety-six.     Not  one,  of 


ENGLISH   DICTIONARIES  353 

all  this  number,  from  the  first,  self-abased^  to  the  mid- 
most, self-de7uaU  and  the  last,  sdf-icrong,  has  a  right 
to  a  place  in  an  English  dictionary  ;  for  in  every  case 
self^  in  the  simple,  primitive  sense  it  always  ])reserves, 
is  a  mere  adjective,  qualifying  the  word  that  follows  it ; 
and  there  is  no  reason  why,  if  the  combinations  thus 
detailed  should  appear  in  a  dictionary,  all  other  possi- 
ble combinations  of  self  should  not  also  be  presented. 
The  list  is  either  entirely  superfluous  or  very  defec- 
tive. In  fact,  such  an  array  is  an  affront  to  the  under- 
standing of  English-speaking  people. 

But  what  need  of  the  further  working  of  a  mine  of 
absurdity  so  rich  that  its  product  is  not  worth  taking 
out,  and  so  homogeneous  that  one  specimen  is  just 
like  another?  Let  the  reader  turn  the  pages  himself, 
and  think  as  he  turns.  Besides  such  compounds  as 
those  just  cited,  let  him  remark  the  array  of  words 
joined  to  the  common  adverbs  and  adjectives  that 
come  correctly  from  the  lips  of  the  most  ignorant  man 
a  hundred  times  daily.  Of  ever,  thirty-four.  (Why 
not  three  hundred  and  forty  ?)  Ever-active  is  pre- 
sent, and  ever-silent,  absent :  we  have  ever-living,  but 
why  not  ever-running  ?  Of  out,  over,  less,  after,  coun- 
ter, all,  back,  free,  foot,  fore,  high,  and  the  like,  the 
compounds  swarm  upon  the  page.  Finall}^,  let  him 
not  inspect,  but  take  a  bird's-eye  view  (for  life  is  short) 
of  the  hordes  that  troop  under  the  standards  of  dis, 
and  mis,  and  i7i,  and  inter,  and  vn,  and  re,  and  sidj, 
and  ex,  and  the  like,  not  one  in  a  hundred  of  which 
has  any  more  right  to  a  place  in  a  dictionary  than  one 
man  has  to  enlist  under  two  names  and  draw  two  ra- 
tions ;  or  than  a  Fenian  has  to  stir  up  insurrection  in 
Ireland  as  an  Irishman,  and  to  vote  twice  in  New 
York  as  what  he  calls  an  "  American  citizen."     Upon 


354  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

this  point  Johnson's  successors  have  bettered  his  in- 
structions with  a  vengeance  ;  for  they  have  more  than 
doubled   his    array  of  words  with    particle    prefixes. 
Rather,  they  have  bettered  Johnson's  practice,  and  set 
at  naught  his  instructions.    For  on  this  point  he  taught 
much  more  wisely  than  he  practiced.     It  is  one  upon 
which  a  few  examples  will  serve  our  purpose.     For 
instance,  agree,  agreeable,  appear,  approve,  arm,  being 
given  in  a  dictionary,  upon  what  supposition  or  pre- 
tence of  need  can  disagree,  disagreeable,  disappear, 
disapprove,  and  disarm,  be  given  ?     We  are  properly 
told   all   about  trust;  and  could   there  be  a  better 
reason    why   not    a  word    is   needed    upon  distrust? 
And  yet  we  have,  in   all   such  cases,    not  only   the 
simple  word,  and  also  the  simple  word  with  the  pre- 
fix, but  all  the  inflections    and  derivatives   of  both  ; 
trust,  trusted,  truster,  trustful,  trustfully,  trustfulness, 
trustily,  trustiness,  trusting  and  trustingly,  and  then 
soberly  distrust,  distrusted,    distruster,    distrustful, 
distrustfully,  distrustfidriess,    distrustily,    distrusti- 
ness,  distrusting,  and,  distrustingly.     In  like  manner 
are  paraded  the  combinations  of  all  the  other  particle 
prefixes.     Of    words    compounded  with  dis  Johnson 
gave  637,  Webster  gives  1334  ;  of  words  compounded 
with   un  Johnson  gave    1864,  Webster   gives  8935  ; 
these  two  prefixes  heading  a  catalogue  of  more  than 
5000  words,   so  called,   and  such  compounds  as  un- 
witty,  unsoft,  and  unsuit,  going  to  make  up  the  mul- 
titude.^    In  Webster's  Dictionary,  the  Imperial,  and 
Worcester's,  compoimds  like  those  previously  noticed 
comprise   one  tenth  of    the  vocabulary,    from    which, 

^  The  counting  for  this  statement,  and  some  others  in  this 
chapter,  was  careful!}'  made  for  me  by  one  whom  I  have  learned 
to  rely  upon  ;  and  although  it  may  be  not  exactly  correct,  I  am 
sure  that  it  is  nearly  enough  so  for  our  purpose. 


ENGLISH   DICTIONARIES  355 

nevertheless,  words  used  by  English  authors  of  re- 
pute, and  b}^  Engiish-sjicaking  people  the  world  over, 
are  omitted.  If  we  did  not  know  b}^  what  contrivances 
dictionaries  are  sold,  and  how  thoughtlessly  they 
are  bought  and  consulted,  we  might  well  wonder  that 
books  thus  made  up  had  not  long  ago  been  scouted 
out  of  use  and  out  of  sight.  Here  is  page  after 
page,  from  the  beginning  of  the  book  to  the  end, 
filled  with  matter  that  is  worse  than  worthless,  the 
very  presence  of  which  is  an  affront  to  the  common 
sense  of  common  people.  For  no  man  who  has  intel- 
ligence enough  and  knowledge  enough  to  need  a  dic- 
tionary at  all,  or  to  know  what  one  is,  requires  one 
in  which  arm  and  disarm^  armed  and  unarmed^  take 
and  retahe^  hcnt  and  unhent,  bifid  and  unhind  and 
the  like  pairs,  are  both  given.  To  say  the  least,  the 
latter  are  mere  superfluity,  cumbering  the  pages  on 
which  they  aj^pear.  And  yet  it  is  largely  by  the 
insertion  of  compound,  or  rather  of  double  words  (for 
they  are  few  of  them  really  compounded),  like  dining- 
room,,  Jieart-consumhuj ,  and  tooth-drawer^  and  of 
words  with  particle  prefixes,  that  dictionary-makers 
sustain  their  boasts  that  their  books  contain  so  many 
more  thousand  words  than  those  of  their  predecessors, 
or  than  their  own  of  previous  editions.  Dictionaries 
made  in  this  manner  are  the  merest  catalogues  of  all 
possible  verbal  and  syllabic  combinations,  —  notably 
and  necessarily  incomplete  catalogues,  too,  for  there  is 
no  end  to  word-making  of  this  kind.  The  compound- 
ing of  the  words  already  in  the  language  may  go  on 
ad  injinitnm,  and  on  such  a  plan  of  lexicography  the 
introduction  of  a  new  verb  or  noun  would  have  conse- 
quences too  numerous,  if  not  too  serious,  to  mention.^ 
^  "  Again,  there  is  a  defect  of  true  insight  into  what  are  the 


356  WORDS  AND   THEIR  USES 

Another  way  of  increasing  the  bulk,  impairing  the 
worth,  and  diminishing  the  convenience  of  dictiona- 
ries, is  the  hauling  into  them  —  as  with  a  drag-net  — 
of  all  the  technical  words  that  can  be  captured.  John- 
son began  this  vicious  practice.  In  his  work  we  find 
'polysyndeton,  ecphractick,  stricB,  zocle,  quadriphyllous, 
and  many  of  like  sort.  His  successors  and  imitators 
have  improved  upon  him  —  Webster,  as  usual,  far 
outdoing  all.  "  His  Dictionary,"  —  as  Archbishop 
Trench  remarks,  "  while  it  is  scanted  of  the  barest 
necessaries  which  such  a  work  ought  to  possess,  af- 
fords, in  about  a  page  and  a  half,  the  following  choice 
additions  to  the  English  language  :  zeolitiform,  zinJc- 
iferous,  zinhy,  zooj)hytological,  zumosimeter,  zygodac- 
tylous,  zygomatic,  with  some  twenty  more."  Thus  far 
Trench.  But  it  should  be  added  that  such  words  as 
these,  and  those  given  from  Johnson,  are  no  jDart  of  the 
English  language.  They  belong  to  no  language.  They 
are  a  part  of  the  terminology  common  to  science  and 
to  scientific  men  of  all  tongues  and  nations.  When 
technical  words,  like  zenith  and  nadir,  have  passed 
from  technical  into  general  use,  they  may  claim  a 
l)lace  in  an  English  dictionary,  but  not  before. 

proper  bounds  and  limits  of  a  dictionary,  in  the  admission  into 
it  of  the  innumerable  family  of  compound  epithets,  such  as  cloud- 
capped,  heaven-saluting,  Jlower-enwoven,  and  the  like.  .  .  .  Here 
is,  in  a  great  part,  an  explanation  of  the  twenty  thousand  words 
which  he  [Webster]  boasts  are  to  be  found  in  his  pages,  over  and 
above  those  included  in  the  latest  edition  of  Todd.  Admitting 
these  transient  combinations  as  though  they  were  really  new 
words,  it  would  have  been  easy  to  have  increased  his  twenty 
thousand  by  twenty  thousand  more. 

"Richardson  very  properly  excludes  all  these  ;  where  he  errs, 
it  is,  perhaps,  in  the  opposite  extreme,  in  neglecting  some  true 
and  permanent  coalitions."  —  Trench,  On  Some  Deficiencies  in 
our  English  Dictionaries. 


ENGLISH   DICTIONARIES  357 

I  liave  spoken  of  the  book  called  "  Webster's  Amer- 
ican Dictionary "  in  terms  that  are  not  applied  to  a 
thing  that  is  a  model  of  its  kind.  But,  as  I  have 
already  said,  in  its  present  form,  its  objectionable 
traits  are  due  merely  to  the  fact  that  in  it  a  radically 
vicious  plan  is  followed  to  an  absurd  extreme.  What- 
ever was  once  peculiar  to  a  book  bearing  its  title  was 
bad  in  itself  and  pernicious  in  its  effects.  But  as  the 
years  have  gone  on  during  which  the  book  has  been 
forced  into  use  by  business  combinations  of  publish- 
ers and  printers,  adroitly  and  ceaselessly  employed,  it 
has  been  modified,  piece  by  piece,  here  and  there,  and 
always  in  its  characteristic  features,  until  now  those 
features  have  altogether  disappeared.  As  it  laid  aside 
its  peculiar  traits  it  ceased  to  have  peculiar  faults  ; 
its  offensiveness  passed  away  with  its  individuality. 
When  it  was  Webster's,  and  was  "  American,"  it  was 
a  book  to  laugh  at  and  be  ashamed  of  ;  but  now, 
having,  by  the  protracted  labors  of  able  scholars  in 
both  hemispheres,  been  purged  of  its  singularities  in 
orthography  and  etymology,  and  partly  in  definition, 
and  having,  ceased  to  be  Webster's  (except  in  regard 
to  definitions)  and  American  (except  as  to  the  place 
of  publication),  it  has  become  as  convenient  and 
trustworthy  a  compilation  of  its  kind  as  any  other 
now  before  the  public.  For  between  such  dictiona- 
ries as  Worcester's,  the  Imperial,  and  Webster's  in  the 
last  edition,  there  is  not  a  choice  worth  the  toss  of  a 
copper.  In  their  labor-saving,  thought-lulling  conven- 
ience, as  in  their  serious  faults,  their  many  and  grave 
deficiencies,  and  their  needless,  inconvenient,  and 
costly  cumbrousness,  they  are  alike. 

It  is  always  easier  to  criticise,  and  particularly  to 
find  fault,  than  to  make  or  to  plan  that  which  will  bear 


358  WORDS  AND  THEIR   USES 

criticism.  Yet  we  all  must  criticise,  and  we  all  do 
find  fault,  from  our  uprising  to  our  down-lying,  from 
birth  to  death,  or  else  what  is  bad  would  never  be 
good,  and  what  is  good  would  never  be  better.  Nor 
is  it  necessary  that  we  should  be  able  to  cook  our  din- 
ners, to  make  our  clothes,  or  to  compile,  or  even 
plan,  our  dictionaries,  that  we  should  know  and  declare 
whether  they  are  well  cooked,  made,  or  planned.  As 
to  a  dictionary,  T  will  venture  to  sketch  the  plan  of 
one  ;  such  a  one  as  has  not  been  made,  and  as  I  pre- 
sume to  hope  Home  Tooke  had  in  mind  when  he  wrote 
the  passage  which  I  have  quoted. 

A  dictionary,  or  better,  a  word-book,  made  for  the 
use  of  those  to  whom  its  language  is  vernacular, 
should  be  very  different  in  its  vocabulary  and  in  its 
definitions  from  the  lexicon  of  a  foreign  tongue.  So 
a  grammar  written  for  the  use  of  those  born  to  its  lan- 
guage-subject, should  omit  countless  items,  great  and 
small,  that  must  be  cai*efully  set  forth  for  the  instruc- 
tion of  foreigners.  But  one  great  vice  of  our  diction- 
aries, as  of  our  grammars,  is,  that  they  are  planned 
and  written  as  if  for  men  who  know  nothing  of  their 
own  language ;  the  fact  being  that  the  most  ignorant 
of  those  who  take  up  dictionary  and  grammar  have 
a  knowledge  of  their  mother  tongue  that  a  life's 
study  of  both  books  can  neither  give  nor  take  away. 
In  making  a  lexicon  of  a  foreign  tongue,  it  must  be 
assumed  that  the  person  consulting  it  is  ignorant  of 
the  combinations,  the  idioms,  the  inflections,  contrac- 
tions, and  all  the  minute  variations  of  its  simple  words, 
which  are  matters  of  the  earliest  knowledge  to  those 
to  whom  the  language  is  vernacular.  This  difference 
between  what  is  needed  in  a  vernacular  word-book 
and  a  foreign  lexicon  being  constantly  borne  in  mind, 


ENGLISH  DICTIONARIES  359 

the  first  end  sought  in  making  a  dictionary  should  be 
the  inehision  of  all  simple  English  words  used  by 
writers  of  repute  since  the  formation  of  the  language, 
at  about  a.  d.  1250,  beginning  with  the  works  of  Wy- 
cliffe,  Chaucer,  and  Gower.  The  omission  of  any 
such  word  would  be  a  defect  in  the  dictionary.  The 
plea  of  obsoleteness  is  no  justification  for  such  an 
omission.  There  is  no  obsoleteness  in  literature.^  The 
old,  irregular  orthography  is  not  to  be  followed,  nor 
need  the  old  inflections  be  given  ;  but  a  professed  dic- 
tionary of  the  English  language  which  does  not  con- 
tain all  the  simple  words  and  their  compounds  of 
deflected  meaning,  which  are  used  by  an  English  poet 
of  such  eminence  as  Chaucer,  is  not  what  its  name 
pretends  it  to  be.  The  addition  of  such  of  these  words 
as  are  now  omitted  from  our  dictionaries  would  not 
increase  their  bulk  appreciably,  as  may  be  seen  by  an 
examination    of  the  glossaries   to   our  authors  from 

^  "  In  regard  of  obsolete  words,  our  dictiouaries  have  no  certain 
rule  of  admission  or  exclusion.  But  how,  it  maybe  asked,  ought 
they  to  hold  themselves  in  regard  of  these  ?  This  question  has  been 
already  implicitly  answered  in  what  was  just  said  regarding  the 
all-comprehensive  character  which  belongs  to  them.  There  are 
some,  indeed,  who,  taking  up  a  position  a  little  different  from 
theirs  who  would  have  them  contain  only  the  standard  words  of 
the  language,  yet  proceeding  on  the  same  inadequate  view  of  their 
object  and  intention,  count  that  they  should  aim  at  presenting 
the  body  of  the  language  as  now  existing  ;  this  and  no  more  ; 
leaving  to  archaic  glossaries  the  gathering  in  of  words  that  are 
current  no  longer.  But  a  little  reflection  will  show  how  untena- 
ble is  this  position  ;  how  this  rule,  consistently  carried  out,  would 
deprive  a  dictionary  of  a  large  part  of  its  usefulness.  .  .   . 

"  It  is  quite  impossible,  with  any  consistency,  to  make  a  stand 
anywhere,  or  to  admit  any  words  now  obsolete  without  including, 
or  at  least  attempting  to  include  all." —  Trench,  On  Deficient 
des,  etc. 


360  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

Chaucer  to  Spenser.  And  besides,  it  is  to  be  remem- 
bered that  the  voluminousness  of  the  dictionary,  as 
it  is  at  present  known  to  us,  is  to  be  abated  materi- 
ally by  the  next  provision  of  our  plan,  which  is,  that 
of  compound  or  double  words  and  words  formed  by 
particle  prefixes  only  those  have  a  proper  place  in  a 
dictionary  in  which  (1)  the  combination  has  acquired 
a  meaning  different  from  that  of  the  mere  union  of  its 
elements,  or  (2)  one  of  the  elements  is  known,  or 
used,  only  in  combination.  Thus,  if  disease  had  con- 
tinued to  mean  only  dis  and  ease,  or  the  negation  of 
ease,  as  it  does  in  the  following  lines  from  Chaucer's 
"  Troilus  and  Creseide,"  — 

"  And  therewithal!  Creseide  anon  he  Mst, 
Of  whiche'  certain  she  felt  no  disease,"  — 

there  would  be  no  need  of  it  in  an  English  dictionary 
made  for  men  to  whom  English  is  their  mother- 
tongue.  But  it  has  acquired  a  modified  and  an  addi- 
tional meaning,  and  therefore  should  be  given  as  a 
distinct  word.  So  should  disable,  because  able  is 
unknown  as  a  verb  ;  and,  for  a  like  reason,  How- 
ell's dister  (Letters,  Book  I.,  Sec.  3,  Letter  32)  ;  but 
in  an  English  dictionary  in  which  inter  appears,  dis- 
inter has  no  proper  place.  So  breakfast,  having  come 
to  mean  something  less,  or  more,  or  other  than  the 
mere  brea]|iing  of  fast,  must  be  given.  But  to  give 
hreahfast-room,  or  dining-room,  is  as  absurd  as  to 
give  joint-stock-company,  which  Webster  does ;  and 
why  joint-stoch-company-limited  should  not  as  well 
be  given,  it  would  be  as  difficult  to  discover,  as  why 
we  are  instructed  upon  fiddle-string  and  fiddle-stich, 
but  are  left  in  our  native  ignorance  as  to  fiddle-bow, 
and  in  utter  darkness  upon  the  subject  of  the  fitting 
tail-piece  of  this  list  — fiddle-stick^ s-end.    Words  like 


ENGLISH  DICTIONARIES  3G1 

after-thought^  counter-act,  and  unsound  have  no  place 
in  a  dictionary,  except,  perhaps,  in  a  list  of  com- 
pounds under  after,  counter,  and  un  ;  but  words  like 
aftermath,  counterfeit,  and  imcouth,  in  which  one  ele- 
ment is  known  only  in  composition,  should  of  course 
be  defined.  Double  words,  like  blacksmith  and  white- 
smith, in  which  one  of  the  elements  has  a  deflected  or 
perverted  signification,  should  be  given  ;  but  what 
good  end,  for  any  human  creature  with  wit  enough 
to  find  a  word  in  a  dictionary,  is  gained  by  giving 
such  double  words  as  silver-smith,  gold-smithy  copper- 
smith  f 

Nor  does  vulgarity  more  than  obsoleteness  justify 
the  omission  of  any  English  word.  Dictionaries  are 
mere  books  of  reference,  made  to  be  consulted,  not  to 
be  read.  In  the  bear-baiting  days  of  Queen  Eliza- 
beth it  might  be  said  without  offence  of  a  vile,  dull 
man,  that  he  was  "  not  fit  to  carry  guts  to  a  bear." 
Nowadays  a  man  who  used,  in  general  society,  the 
simple  English  word  for  which  some  New  England 
*'  females  "  elegantly  substitute  iii'ards,  would  shock 
many  of  his  hearers.  But  this  is  no  good  reason  for 
the  omission  of  the  word  from  a  dictionary.  Through 
mere  squeamishness,  words,  once  in  general  use,  are 
shimned  more  and  more,  until  at  last  they  are  re- 
garded as  gross  and  low,  when  the  things  and  thoughts 
of  which  they  are  the  mere  names  are,  and  always 
must  remain,  on  the  same  level.  If  need  be,  no  one 
hesitates  now  to  speak  of  intestines.  Home  Tooke 
has  well  said,  "  It  is  the  object  for  which  words  are 
used  and  the  manner  of  their  use  that  give  that  use 
its  character ;  "  and  also  that  what  are  called  vulgar 
words  are  "  the  oldest  and  best  authorized,  the  most 
significant  and  widely-used  words  in  the  language." 


362  WORDS  AND   THEIR  USES 

No  man  need  use  them  or  seek  them  in  a  dictionary 
unless  he  chooses  to  do  so.^ 

Although  words  obsolete  in  the  speech  of  the  day 
should  be  given,  provincial  words  are  out  of  place  in 
a  dictionary  of  standard  and  established  English.^ 

Proper  names  are  no  part  of  language  ;  and  whether 
words  formed  upon  proper  names,  such  as  Moham- 
medanism, Mormonism,  Swedenborgian,  have  claim 
to  recognition  as  a  part  of  the  English  language  is  at 
least  very  doubtful.  Their  inclusion  in  a  dictionary 
might  be  defended  on  the  ground  that  it  would  be  con- 
venient to  have  them  there ;  but  on  the  same  grounds  a 
chronological  table,  a  list  of  post-offices,  or  the  best 
recipes  for  curing  corns,  might  well  be  given.  A  dic- 
tionary of  the  English  language  is  not  an  encyclopaedia 
of  useful  information.^ 

^  "  A  dictionary,  then,  according  to  that  idea  of  it  which 
seems  to  me  alone  capable  of  being  logically  maintained,  is  an 
inventory  of  the  language  ;  much  more,  indeed,  but  this  prima- 
rily ;  and  with  this  only  at  present  we  will  deal.  It  is  no  task 
of  the  maker  of  it  to  select  the  good  words  of  language.  If  he 
fancies  that  it  is  so,  and  begins  to  pick  and  choose,  to  leave  this, 
and  to  take  that,  he  will  at  once  go  astray.  The  business  which 
he  has  undertaken  is  to  collect  and  arrange  all  words,  whether 
good  or  bad,  whether  they  commend  themselves  to  his  judgment 
or  otherwise,  which,  with  certain  exceptions  hereafter  to  be  spe- 
cified, those  writing  in  the  language  have  employed.  He  is  an 
historian  of  it,  not  a  critic."  — Trench,  On  Some  Deficiencies,  etc. 

2  "  Let  me  observe  here,  that  provincial  or  local  words  stand 
on  quite  a  different  footing  from  obsolete.  We  do  not  complain 
of  their  omission.  In  my  judgment  we  should,  on  the  contrary, 
have  a  right  to  complain  if  they  were  admitted  ;  and  it  is  an  over- 
sight that  some  of  our  dictionaries  occasionally  find  room  for 
them,  in  their  avowed  character  of  provincial  words  ;  when,  in- 
deed, as  such,  they  have  no  right  to  a  place  in  a  dictionary  of 
the  English  tongue."  —  Trench,  On  Some  Deficiencies,  etc. 

^  "  It  is  strange  that  Johnson's  strong  common  sense  did  not 


ENGLISH  DICTIONARIES  3G3 

Definitions,  unless  we  would  have  them  sprout  into 
the  multitudinous  absurdities  which  have  been  already- 
held  up  to  the  light  in  this  chapter,  must  be  formed 
upon  the  principle,  which  is  axiomatic  in  language, 
that  a  word  can  have  but  one  real  meaning.  Of  this, 
all  others  — the  all  being  few  —  are  subsidiary  modi- 
fications ;  and  of  this  meaning,  the  metaphorical  appli- 
cations being  numberless,  unascertainable,  dependent 
upon  the  will  and  the  taste  of  every  writer  and  speaker 
in  the  language,  have  no  proper  place  in  a  dictionary. 
This  renders  quotation  in  support  of  definition  gener- 
ally superfluous.  The  maker  of  a  dictionary  for  gen- 
eral use,  i.  e.,  a  hand  word-book,  is  not  called  upon  to 
give  a  brief  history  and  epitome  of  his  language,  with 
the  purpose  of  illuminating  his  pages  or  of  justifying 
his  vocabulary. 

Figures,  diagrams,  and  the  like  (first  used,  not  in 
this  country,  but  in  England  by  Bailey),  are  not  only 
superfluous  in  a  dictionary,  but  pernicious.  Language 
is  the  subject-matter  of  a  dictionary ;  its  function  is  to 
explain  words,  not  to  describe  things.  The  introduc- 
tion of  a  figure  or  a  diagram  is  a  confession  of  an 
inability  which  does  not  exist.  The  pictorial  illustra- 
tions with  which  dictionaries  have  lately  been  so  copi- 
ously defaced,  merely  to  catch  the  unthinking  eye,  are 

save  him  from  falling  into  this  error,  but  it  has  not.  He  might 
lyell  have  spared  us  thirteen  closely  printed  lines  on  an  opal, 
nineteen  on  a  rose,  twenty-one  ou  the  almug-tree,  as  many  ou 
the  air-pump,  not  fewer  on  the  natural  history  of  the  armadillo, 
and  rather  more  than  sixty  on  the  pear.  All  this  is  repeated  by 
Todd,  and  in  an  exaggerated  form  by  Webster,  from  whom,  for 
instance,  we  may  learn  of  the  camel,  that  it  constitutes  the  riches 
of  the  Arabian,  that  it  can  sustain  abstinence  from  drink  for 
many  days,  and  in  all  twenty-five  lines  of  its  natural  history." 
*  -  Trench,  On  Some  Deficiencies,  etc. 


364  WORDS  AND   THEIR  USES 

entirely  out  of  place.  They  pertain  to  encyclopaedias. 
And,  indeed,  the  dictionaries  of  the  last  crop,  such  as 
the  Imperial,  Worcester's,  and  the  so-called  Web- 
ster's, are  too  much  like  encyclopaedias  to  be  dictiona- 
ries, and  too  much  like  dictionaries  to  be  encylopsedias. 
Their  pictures  are  as  much  in  place  as  a  fall  of  real 
water  would  be  in  a  painting  of  Niagara ;  which,  doubt- 
less, would  also  be  prononnced  "  a  very  popular  fea- 
ture." 

In  giving  the  etymology  of  an  English  word  it  is 
not  necessary,  and  is  rarely  proper,  to  trace  it  beyond 
the  Anglo-Saxon,  Norman-French,  Latin,  Greek,  or 
other  word  from  which  it  is  directly  derived.  A  dic- 
tionary is  a  word-book  of  reference,  not  a  treatise  on 
general  philology.  To  what  purpose  is  it  that  a  man 
who  consults  a  dictionary  for  the  meaning,  the  form, 
or  the  sound  of  a  word  in  the  English  language,  is 
informed  that  before  the  existence  of  his  language,  or 
since,  a  word  with  which  the  object  of  his  search  has 
possibly  some  remote  connection  had,  or  has,  in  an- 
other language,  the  same,  a  like,  or  a  different  mean- 
ing? Whether  the  word  should  be  traced  from  its 
primitive  meaning  down  to  that  which  it  has  in  present 
usage,  or  from  the  present  usage  (which  is  that  for 
which  a  dictionary  is  chiefly  consulted)  up  to  its  primi- 
tive meaning,  is  not  quite  clear.  The  latter  arrange- 
ment seems  to  be  the  more  natural  and  logical. 

In  orthography  the  usage  of  the  best  writers,  modi- 
fied, if  at  all,  by  a  leaning  toward  analogy,  is  the  only 
guide  to  authoritative  usefulness,  as  even  the  publish- 
ers of  Webster's  Dictionary  have  at  last  been  obliged 
in  practice  to  admit. 

In  pronunciation  the  usage  of  the  most  cultivated 
people  of  English  blood  and  speech  is  absolute,  as  far 


ENGLISH  DICTIONARIES  3G5 

as  their  usage  itself  is  fixed.  But  the  least  valuable 
part  of  a  dictionary  is  that  which  is  given  to  orthoepy. 
Pronuuciation  is  the  most  arbitrary,  varying,  and 
evanescent  trait  of  language  ;  and  it  is  so  exceedingly 
difficult  to  express  sound  by  written  characters,  that  to 
convey  it  upon  paper  with  certainty  in  one  neighbor- 
hood for  ten  years,  and  to  the  world  at  large  for  one 
year,  is  practically  impossible.^ 

Upon  the  plan  thus  lightly  sketched,  an  English 
dictionary  might  be  made  which  would  give  a  vocab- 
ulary of  the  language  from  its  formation,  with  full  and 
exact  definitions,  etymology,  and  pronunciation,  and 
which  yet  would  be  a  convenient  hand-book  in  clear 
typography,  and  which  could  be  sold  at  half  the  price 
now  paid  for  "  the  best,"  whichever  that  may  be. 

1  With  the  request  that  I  should  give  some  attention  to  the 
subject  of  elocution  —  a  request  made  chiefly  by  readers  who 
seem  to  suffer  under  the  stated  preaching  of  the  gospel  —  I  can- 
not comply.  According  to  my  observation,  elocution  cannot  be 
taught  ;  and  systems  of  elocution  are  as  much  in  vain  as  the 
physicians  immortalized  on  the  gravestone  that  fascinated  the 
young  eyes  of  David  Copperfield.  The  ability  to  speak  with 
grace  and  force  is  a  gift  of  nature  that  may  be  improved  by  ex- 
ercise and  observation,  but  very  little,  if  at  all,  by  instruction. 
What  can  be  profitably  said  upon  this  subject  has  been  well  said 
by  Mr.  Gould  in  his  book,  Good  English. 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

"JUS    ET   NORMA    LOQUENDI." 

Walking  down  the  Bowery  one  morning  of  last 
spring,  I  met  a  lad  who  took  a  paper  from  a  package 
that  he  carried  and  thrust  it  into  my  unwilling  hand. 
I  suspected  him  of  having  laid  in  wait  for  the  pur- 
pose ;  for  on  looking  at  the  paper  I  found  on  it  a 
printed  announcement  in  these  words  :  — 

Being  about  to  inaugurate  my  Sample  Room  at  No.  —  Bow- 
ery on  the  16th  instant,  I  invite  my  friends  to  be  present  at  a  Free 
Lunch  on  that  occasion. 

N.  B.  —  Liquors  and  everything  first  class. 

A— B— . 

It  is  probable  that  neither  this  young  gentleman 
nor  his  employer  had  given  his  days  and  nights  to  the 
perusal  of  the  first  edition  of  a  certain  book,  which 
need  not  be  named  on  this  page,  or  they  would  not 
have  singled  out  its  author  for  the  unexpected  honor 
of  an  invitation  to  the  inauguration  of  a  "  sample- 
room."  And  yet  possibly,  even  in  that  case,  they, 
knowing  the  proverbial  impecuniosity  of  literary  men, 
might  have  supposed  that,  considering  the  tempting 
terms  on  which  entertainment  was  proffered,  I  might 
be  induced  to  be  present  on  that  occasion.  However 
that  might  be,  I  did  not  scorn  the  invitation,  but,  for 
purposes  of  my  own  which  have  taken  me  to  places 
even  less  to  my  liking  than  a  "  sample-room,"  on  the 


"JUS   ET  NORMA   LOQUENDI"  3G7 

appointed  day  I  was  present  at  the  inaugural  ceremo- 
nies, wliicli  I  observed  were  of  a  very  interesting  na- 
ture to  those  who  took  part  in  them.  I  will  confess, 
too,  as  Dr.  Johnson  once  did,  that  at  the  early  hour 
at  which  I  made  my  visit  I  was  impransus  ;  but  how 
much  I  ate  and  drank,  I  shall  never  tell ;  and  as  to 
how  many  brethren  of  my  craft  were  also  present,  I 
shall  ever  preserve  a  discreet  silence.  Far  be  it  from 
me  to  reveal  to  a  curious  and  unsympathizing  world 
how  the  priests  of  literature  eke  out  their  scanty 
means,  and  supply  the  wants  of  nature  from  the  deo- 
dands  of  such  inaugural  sacrifices. 

I  remained  long  enough  to  discover  that,  whether 
the  liquors  were  first-class  or  not,  the  language  was. 
Among  the  choice  morsels  with  which  I  was  regaled 
was  the  remark  of  a  gentleman  with  a  pallid  face, 
and  a  heavy  mustache  very  black  in  the  mass  and 
very  red  just  at  the  roots,  who  wore  a  dirty  shirt  con- 
fined by  a  brilliant  pin  worth  at  least  five  thousand 
dollars.  Evidently  disgusted  with  either  the  quality 
or  the  quantity  of  his  entertainment,  he  said  as  he 
swaggered  out,  "  Blessid  is  them  wot  don't  expect 
nawthin' ;  for  them's  the  ones  wot  won't  git  disap- 
pointed." Another  gentleman,  who  as  plainly  was 
better  pleased  with  his  luncheon,  replying  for  himself 
and  a  companion  to  an  inquiry  as  to  how  he  had  fared, 
said,  "  Other  fellers  goes  in  for  the  fried  liver,  but 
me  and  him  comes  down  orful  on  the  corn  beef."  I 
was  not  surprised  to  hear  another  free-luncher  assert 
with  emphasis  that  his  host  was  a  perfect  gentleman, 
and  that  he  wished  he  would  inaugurate  every  day. 
Soon  after  which  I  departed,  no  less  pleased  with  my 
entertainment  than  he  with  his  !  I  had  gotten  all 
1  came  for;  and  at  how  many  receptions,  at  which 


368  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

luncheon  is  also  free  (although  that,  of  course,  is 
never  thought  of),  can  a  man  say  as  much  as  he  goes 
away,  leaving  "  society  "  behind  him  ? 

Now,  if  the  first  mentioned  of  my  convives  had 
uttered  his  apophthegm  in  the  form,  Blessed  are 
they  who  expect  nothing,  for  they  will  not  be  disap- 
pointed, and  if  the  other  had  said.  He  and  I  come 
down  awfully  on  the  corned  beef,  and  the  remainder 
of  the  company  had  discoursed  in  like  manner,  I  con- 
fess that  the  entertainment  would  have  lacked  for  me 
the  seasoning  that  gave  it  all  its  savor.  Their  talk 
afforded  me  the  enjoyment  of  an  inward  laugh.  But 
why  was  it  so  ridiculous  ?  Merely  because  it  was  at 
variance  with  cultivated  usage  ?  I  think  not.  It 
seems  to  me  that  the  amusing  element  in  such  a  use 
of  language  is  absurdity,  —  the  absurdity  which  is  the 
consequence  of  incongruity.  Their  meaning  was  as 
unmistakable  as  if  their  sentences  had  been  con- 
structed by  a  pedagogue  ;  but  with  this  intelligibility 
there  was  a  confusion  due  to  the  heterogeneous  incon- 
gruity of  the  words  with  their  position  and  their  real 
significance.  The  combination  of  singular  verbs  with 
plural  nouns,  the  use  of  words  e:^ressing  an  object 
in  the  place  of  those  which  express  a  subject,  of  those 
which  express  the  quality  of  a  thing  to  tell  the  man- 
ner of  an  act,  —  this  incongruity  was  the  cause  of  the 
laughable  absurdity.  To  a  certain  extent,  indeed,  the 
violation  of  usage  was  at  the  bottom  of  this  absurdity ; 
for  if  usage  had  not  made  the  verb  is  singular,  and 
the  pronoun  them  objective,  the  word  awful  expressive 
of  quality,  and  corn  a  substantive,  and  so  forth,  there 
would  have  been  no  incongruity.  But  here  the  point 
to  be  observed  is,  that  usage  does  not  act  arbitrarily. 
It  is  guided,  almost  governed,  by  a  union  of  the  forces 
of  precedent  and  reason. 


"JUS   ET   NORMA  LOQUENDI "  3G9 

Within  certain  limits,  usa^^e  has  absohite  authority 
in  language.  To  assert  this  is  not  to  lay  down  a 
law,  or  to  set  up  a  standard,  but  merely  to  recognize 
a  fact.  For  as  the  only  use  of  language,  outside  of 
Talleyrandic  diplomacy,  is  to  express,  and  not  to 
conceal,  our  ideas,  and  as  language  which  does  not 
conform  to  the  general  usage  of  those  to  whom  it  is 
addressed  cannot  convey  to  them  the  meaning  of  the 
speaker  or  of  the  writer,  such  language  fails  to  fulfil 
the  first,  if  not  the  only,  condition  of  its  being.  It 
has  been  said  that  the  usage  which  controls  language 
is  that  of  great  writers  and  cultivated  speakers.  To 
a  certain  extent  this  is  true ;  but  it  is  not  true  with- 
out important  qualification.  For  the  very  necessity 
which  controls  communication  by  words,  that  is,  the 
making  of  a  thought  common  to  the  speaker  and  the 
hearer  by  means  of  a  medium  which  has  a  common 
value  to  both,  is  binding  upon  the  great  writers  and 
the  cultivated  speakers  themselves.  A  man  who  uses 
words  that  are  unknown,  or  familiar  words  in  senses 
that  are  strange,  or  who,  using  familiar  words  in  ac- 
cepted senses,  puts  them  together  in  an  incoherent 
succession,  which  jars  and  interrupts  rather  than 
easily  leads  the  train  of  thought,  will  fail  to  convey 
his  meaning,  whatever  may  be  his  mental  gifts  or  his 
culture.  Ideas  and  facts  may  be  new  or  strange  ;  but 
the  language  in  which  they  are  uttered  must  be  old 
in  fact  or  familiar  in  form,  or  they  cannot  be  im- 
parted. 

This  is  so  manifestly  true  as  to  be  almost  a  truism ; 
and  yet  old  words  do  pass  out  of  use  ;  new  words  do 
come  into  use ;  the  construction  of  language  does 
change,  although  slightly  and  slowly,  in  the  lapse  of 
years.     Are   these   changes   the  work  of   the  great 


370  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

writers  and  the  most  cultivated  speakers  of  a  lan- 
guage ?  It  will  be  found  upon  examination  that  they 
are  not,  —  that  the  very  few  writers  who  can  justly  be 
called  great,  or  even  distinguished,  and  the  compara- 
tively small  class  of  cultivated  speakers,  contribute  to 
such  changes  only  in  proportion  to  their  actual  num- 
bers, even  if  in  that  degree.  The  disuse  of  old  words 
the  adoption  of  new  ones,  and  changes  in  phraseology 
and  in  the  structure  of  the  sentence  are,  or  thus  far 
have  been,  an  insensible,  unconscious  process,  going 
on  among  the  whole  mass  of  those  who  speak  the 
language  in  which  they  occur.  These  changes  are 
made  in  speech,  for  writing  does  little  in  this  respect ; 
in  which  its  chief,  if  not  its  only,  function  is  to  fix 
and  record  that  which  has  already  taken  place  in 
speech.  Upon  this  point  I  hope  that  I  shall  be  ex- 
cused for  repeating  what  I  said  some  years  ago,  that 
the  student  of  language,  or  the  mere  intelligent  ob- 
server of  the  speech  of  his  own  day,  cannot  but  notice 
how  surely  men  supply  themselves  with  a  word,  when 
one  is  needed.  The  new  vocal  sign  is  sometimes 
made  but  is  generally  found.  A  lack  is  felt,  and 
the  common  instinct,  vaguely  stretching  out  its  hands, 
lays  hold  of  some  common,  or  mayhap  some  forgotten 
or  rarely  used,  word,  and,  putting  a  new  stamp  upon 
it,  converts  it  into  current  coin  of  another  denomina- 
tion, a  recognized  representative  of  a  new  intellectual 
value.  Purists  may  fret  at  the  preversion,  and  philo- 
logists may  protest  against  the  genuineness  of  the 
new  mintage,  but  in  vain.  It  answers  the  needs  of 
those  who  use  it;  and  that  it  should  do  so  is  all  that 
they  require.^     It  is  in  a  language  thus  made  that  all 

^  An    Essay  toward   the   Expression  of  Shakespeare's    Genius, 
1865. 


"JUS   ET   NORMA   LOQUENDI  "  371 

writers,  great  or  small,  are  obliged  to  write,  that  all 
speakers,  cultivated  or  uncultivated,  must  needs  utter 
their  daily  wants,  their  thoughts  and  feelings.  In- 
deed, the  excellence  of  speech  and  writing  is  in  no 
small  measure  determined  by  the  taste  and  judgment 
with  which  speaker  or  writer,  yielding  to  the  new  and 
clinging  to  the  old  in  language,  conforms  to  usage 
with  the  discretion  insisted  upon  in  Pojae's  terse  in- 
junction :  — 

"  In  words,  as  fashions,  the  same  rule  will  hold, 
Alike  fantastic  if  too  new  or  old  : 
Be  not  the  first  hy  whom  the  new  are  tried, 
Nor  yet  the  last  to  lay  the  old  aside." 

Essay  on  Criticism,  Part  II. 

Yet  Pope  himself  elsewhere  says  that  great  writers, 
"  the  men  who  write  such  verse  as  we  can  read,"  in 
the  severe  selection  of  their  language,  will 

"  Command  old  words  that  long  have  slept  to  wake, 
Words  that  wise  Bacon  or  brave  Raleigh  spake  ; 
Or  bid  the  new  be  English  ages  hence  ; 
For  use  will  father  what 's  begot  by  sense." 

Second  Epistle  of  the  Second  Book  of  Horace. 

Thus  Pope  himself,  who  affected  preciseness  in  the 
use  of  language  (and  who  yet  in  this  very  passage,  for 
instance,  was  incorrect  in  his  use  of  it,  as  pi'ecisians 
often  are),  on  the  one  hand  recognizes  not  only  right 
but  propriety  in  the  use  of  words  that  would  be 
classed  by  lexicographers  as  obsolete,  and,  on  the  other, 
sets  at  naught  the  purist's  horror  of  neologism.  And 
indeed  there  seems  to  me  nothing  weaker  than  that 
purism  which  shrinks  from  a  word  or  a  phrase  merely 
because  it  is  new.  If  there  are  to  be  no  new  words, 
how  can  language  express  more  than  the  first  and  low- 
est needs  of  human  nature  ?     Without  neologism  Ian- 


372  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

guage  could  not  grow,  could  not  conform  itself  to  the 
new  needs  of  new  generations.  The  question  as  to  a 
word  is  not,  Is  it  new  ?  but.  Is  it  good  ?  And  Pope 
has  given  us  the  test  by  which  to  try  new  words  and 
phrases.  They  must  be  begotten  by  sense.  .But  nnfli. 
parent  of  language  must  be  precedent.  The  language 
of  one  generation  brings  forth  the  language  of  the 
next,  as  surely  as  the  women  of  one  generation  bring 
forth  the  men  of  the  next.  Hence,  indeed,  the  lan- 
guage sf)oken  by  a  people  is  its  mother  tongue.  True 
and  sound  language  is  therefore  the  product  of  prece- 
dent and  reason ;  in  other  words,  it  is  the  normal 
development  of  germs  within  itself.  All  other  speech 
is  monstrous  and  illegitimate.  If  an  unreasonable  and 
monstrous  change  establishes  itself,  men  must  needs 
submit  as  to  any  other  effective  usurpation.  They 
have  no  choice.  But  in  the  discussion  of  a  proposed 
change,  or  of  one  that  is  beginning  to  effect  itself,  our 
test  of  its  normality  must  be  reason  ;  because  there  is  no 
other  by  which  to  determine  its  conformity  to  its  proper 
type.  The  same  rule  applies  to  that  which  is  in  use, 
and  which  it  is  proposed  to  drop  or  modify.  For  if 
we  make  the  use  of  eminent  writers  and  cultivated 
speakers  authoritative,  we  shall  soon  find  ourselves  in- 
volved in  a  conflict  not  only  of  use  with  reason,  and 
of  use  with  precedent,  but  of  use  with  itself.  The 
gift  of  judgment,  imagination,  fancy,  humor,  or  of 
all  these,  does  not  necessarily  make  a  man  correct 
in  his  use  of  language,  although  such  use  does  gen- 
erally accompany  one  or  more  of  those  intellectual 
qualities.  Great  errors  in  language  might  be  justi- 
fied by  the  authority  of  great  writers.  The  saying 
that  in  that  case  they  are  not  errors,  is  a  mere  begging 
of  the  question.     Words  and  phrases  may  have  been 


"JUS  ET  NORMA  LOQUENDl"  373 

used  by  great  writers,  and  yet  be  out  of  the  line  of 
normal  development  of  the  language  ;  and  on  the  other 
hand,  a  word  or  a  phrase  may  have  been  used  only 
once  by  a  writer  without  genius  and  of  inferior  rank, 
or  may  not  have  been  used  at  all,  and  may  yet  be  a 
normal  growth  in  speech,  and  perfectly  good  English. 
An  accomplished  and  thoughtful  writer  on  language 
recently  offered,  as  complete  justification  of  the  use  of 
proven  as  the  past  participle  of  iwove^  the  fact  that 
it  had  been  used  by  Mr.  Lowell.  It  implies  no  dimi- 
nution of  our  delight  in  Mr.  Lowell's  poetry,  in  his 
criticism  or  his  humor,  if  we  admit  that  his  use  of 
language  may  not  be  invariably  correct.  Since  the 
death  of  Hawthorne,  probably  no  writer  of  our  lan- 
guage is  more  irreproachable  in  this  respect  than  the 
author  of  "  Venetian  Life,"  "  Italian  Journeys,"  and 
"  Suburban  Sketches,"  which  make  us  long  to  be  mox-e 
indebted  to  the  same  dainty  pen  ;  yet  Mr.  Howells's 
-pages  have  furnished  a  few  examples  of  incorrect 
English,  —  incorrect  not  because  other  good  writers 
had  not  used  them,  but  because  they  do  not  conform 
to  the  requirements  of  reason  and  precedent  in  the 
English  language.  Mr.  Lowell  has  said  that  the 
objection  to  illy  is  "not  an  etymological  objection," 
but  that  it  is  inconsistent  with  good  usage.  Uly  is 
not  so  violently  at  variance  with  etymology  as  some 
persons  seem  to  think  that  it  is.  But,  if  it  were  so, 
good  usage  would  not  thereby  make  it  correct ;  the 
usage  would  only  in  so  far  cease  to  be  good  (for 
sometimes  it  is  "  so  much  the  worse  for  the  facts  "), 
although,  like  many  other  strong  tyrants,  it  might 
force  base  coin  into  circulation. 

Leaving  out  of  consideration  for  the  present  Shake- 
speare and  the  dramatists  who  immediately  preceded 


374  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

and  followed  him,  —  those  chartered  libertines  of  lan- 
guage, —  let  us  see  where  the  pilotage  of  eminent  usage 
would  land  us.  And  I  will  say  that  my  examples 
have  not  been  curiously  sought  out,  but  are  merely 
transfers  of  memorandums  made  on  the  margins  and 
fly-leaves  of  books  as  I  read  them. 

First,  consider  the  following  use  of  hoth  by  Chau 
car,  a  poet  second  only  to  Shakespeare  :  — 

"0  chaste  goddesse  of  the  woodes  greene, 
To  whom  bothe  heven  and  erthe  and  see  is  seen." 

The  Knight's  Tale,  1.  439. 

Now  for  such  a  use  of  both  the  "  authority,"  that  is, 
the  examj^le,  of  Chaucer,  can  be  of  no  more  weight 
than  that  of  an  anonymous  advertisement  in  a  news- 
paper. Etymology  and  usage,  including  that  of  Chau- 
cer himself  in  other  passages,  make  the  meaning  of 
both,  two  taken  together  ;  and  it  is  impossible  that  the 
same  word  can  mean  two  and  three.  If  fifty  passages 
could  be  produced  from  the  works  of  Chaucer,  Spen- 
ser, Shakespeare,  and  Milton,  in  which  both  was  ap- 
plied to  three  objects,  such  a  use  of  it  by  others  might 
be  excused,  but  it  could  not  be  justified.  The  case  is 
extreme,  but  therefore  of  value :  it  brings  the  point 
out  sharply  ;  and  by  such  examples  a  point  to  be 
established  has  its  best  illustration.  And  there  it  is ; 
both  used  by  one  of  our  greatest  poets  to  mean  three 
taken  together.  It  is  indeed  possible  to  conceive  of 
both^s  being  brought  to  mean  three  or  three  hundred, 
and  the  latter  as  well  as  the  former.  For  that  mat- 
ter, let  the  present  generation  agree  that  both  shall 
mean  fifty-six,  and  the  succeeding  generation  agree  to 
the  same,  and  it  will  thenceforth  so  mean  until  like 
general  consent  shall  assign  to  it  some  other  meaning. 
But  such  is  not  the  way  in  which  words  are  fitted  to 


"JUS  ET  NORMA  LOQUENDI"  375 

thoughts,  even  by  usage,  which  itself  conforms  gen- 
erally to  reason,  and  follows  a  line  of  logical  connec- 
tion and  normal  growth. 

The  word  ])ractitlo7icr,  which  has  already  (p.  198) 
been  remarked  upon  as  abnormal  and  indefensible, 
also  affords  an  illustration  of  the  point  under  dis- 
cussion. It  is  not  a  new  word,  its  use  dating  back 
at  least  three  hundred  years.  Bishop  Latimer,  ac- 
cording to  Richardson,  uses  it  in  his  sermon  on  the 
Lord's  Prayer,  applying  it  to  Satan  :  "  Consider  how 
long  he  hath  bin  a  practitioner  ;  "  and  I  find  it  in 
"  The  Gardener's  Labyrinth "  (ed.  1586)  more  than 
once.  For  example  :  "  Sundrie  practitioners  mixed 
the  bruised  leaves  of  the  cypress  tree,"  etc.  (p.  32). 
We  have  legitimate  words  with  which  the  formation 
of  this  one  seems  to  be  analogous.  Wicliffe  writes, 
"  For  how  manye  weren  possessioneris  of  feldis,"  etc., 
and  Sidney,  "  Having  been  of  old  freedmen  and  pos- 
sessioners."  I  venture  to  say  that  Wicliffe  and  Sid- 
ney might  much  better  have  written  possesso7's  ;  but 
still  there  is  a  noun  possession  from  which  jjosses- 
sioner  may  be  properly  formed.  So  from  redenqHion 
we  have  redemptioner^  and  from  prohation,  proha- 
tloner.  But  there  is  no  noun  practition,  from  which 
to  form  practitio7ier,  and  therefore  even  Latimer  can- 
not make  it  a  normal  product  of  our  language.  As 
to  my  conjecture  that  it  was  formed  in  imitation  of 
the  French  praeticien,  I  have  since  found  the  follow- 
ing interesting  and  confirmatory  passage  in  Stephen's 
"  World  of  Wonders  "  (a.  d.  1616)  :  — 

"  What  reason  is  it  then  that  Lawyers  should  make  tliem 
such  good  sport  for  nothing  ?  Or  that  they  should  be  weary  of 
taking  before  they  be  weary  of  giving  ?  And  I  am  easily  in- 
duced to  thiuke,  that  when  they  were  called  Pragmaticiens,  that 


376  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

is,  Pragmatitioners  (by  the  original  word),  things  were  not  so 
out  of  square  ;  but  since  that  a  sillable  of  their  name  was  clipped 
away,  and  they  called  Practiciens,  that  is,  Practitioners,  they  knew 
well  how  to  make  themselves  amends  for  this  curtailing  of  their 
name,  as  well  upon  their  purses  who  were  not  in  fault,  as  upon 
theirs  who  were  the  authors  thereof."  —  P.  129. 

I  have  pointed  out  in  a  previous  chapter  Pope's  us© 
of  the  perfect  participle  for  the  past  tense,  begun  for 
begati,  sprung  for  sprang^  and  of  the  weak  preterite 
for  the  strong,  as  thrived  for  throve^  shined  for  shone, 
and  the  like.  An  attempt  has  been  made  to  justify 
this  use,  partly  on  the  ground  of  Pope's  authority  as 
an  eminent  poet,  and  partly  on  the  ground  of  usage 
more  or  less  extensive.  What  this  plea  is  worth  will 
appear  on  comparison  of  various  passages  in  works  of 
the  same  author.     For  instance  :  — 

"  Not  with  such  majesty,  such  bold  relief, 
The  forms  august  of  king  or  conquering  chief, 
E'er  swelled  on  marble,  as  in  veree  have  shin'd 
(In  polished  verse)  the  manners  and  the  mind." 

First  Epistle,  Second  Book  of  Horace. 

And,  again,  this  passage  in  the  "  Essay  on  Man"  :-^ 

"  If  parts  allure  thee,  see  how  Bacon  shirCd, 
The  wisest,  brightest,  meanest  of  mankind." 

This  would  seem  to  give  Pope's  authority  in  favor  of 
I  shined,  they  shined,  the  sun  shined.  But  when  we 
read  the  following  passage  from  the  third  book  of  the 
same  essay,  — 

"  Alike  or  when  or  where  they  shone  or  shine, 
Or  on  the  Rubicon  or  on  the  Rhine,"  — 

we  see  that  the  evidence  of  the  former  passages  is 
merely  that  when  Pope  wanted  a  rhyme  he  would  not 
hesitate  to  give  a  strong  verb  a  weak  preterite,  re- 
gardless of  law,  analogy,  or  usage.     When  that  need 


"JUS   ET   NORMA   LOQUENDI"  377 

did  not  press  him,  or  lie  wished  to  gain  a  contrast  of 
sound,  he  wrote  correctly. 

The  following  couplet  from  the  "Essay  on  Criti- 
cism "  I  have  cited  before  for  its  striking  use  of  the 
participle  instead  of  the  preterite  :  — 

"  A  second  deluge  learning  thus  o'errun, 
And  the  monks  finished  what  the  Goths  begun.'" 

So  in  "  Windsor  Forest  "  we  find  :  — ■ 

"  And  now  tlie  shadow  reach' d  her  as  she  run, 
His  shadow  lengthened  by  the  setting  sun." 

Shall  we  then  on  Pope's  authority  say,  When  she 
came  home,  I  run  to  meet  her  ?  The  gentlemen  who 
assisted  at  the  inauguration  of  the  "  sample-room " 
would  thus  be  sustained  in  a  use  of  language  very 
common  with  them.  But  no  ;  for  in  the  "  Essay  on 
Man  "  we  read  :  — 

"  True  faith,  true  policy  united  ran  ; 
That  was  but  love  of  God,  but  this  of  inau." 

And  again,  in  the  same  poem  :  — 

"  In  each  how  guilt  and  greatness  equal  ran, 
And  all  that  raised  the  hero  sunk  the  man." 

Thus,  as  before,  we  see  that  Pope's  rule  in  lan- 
guage was  rhyme,  not  reason  ;  usefulness,  not  usage  ; 
as  we  find  that  it  was  in  the  following  passage  from 
the  same  book  of  the  same  essay,  where  he  does  not 
hesitate  to  use  hegan  and  hegun  interchangeably,  caring 
nothing  for  correctness,  but  only  for  rhyme  :  — 

"  Till  drooping,  sickening,  dying,  they  hegan, 
Wliora  they  rever'd  as  God,  to  mourn  as  man ; 
Then  looking  up  from  sire  to  sire  explor'd 
Our  first  great  father,  and  that  first  ador'd ; 
Or  plain  tradition  that  this  all  begun, 
Conveyed  unbroken  faiths  from  son  to  son." 

Pope's  writings  are  so  filled  with  this  inconsistency, 


378  WORDS  AND   THEIR   USES 

or  rather  this  consistent  disregard  of  correctness  in 
favor  of  rhyme,  rhythm,  or  desired  assonance  or  dis- 
sonance, that  it  would  be  superfluous  to  follow  him 
further  on  this  track.  He  writes,  at  pleasure,  you 
rid  or  you  rode^  they  writ  or  they  wrote^  you  was  or 
you  were.  His  authority  is  evidently  nothing  worth 
in  this  respect ;  and  the  same  may  be  said  of  poets 
generally,  who,  if  they  can  make  themselves  under- 
stood, and  get  the  flow  and  the  sound  of  their  verses 
to  please  their  ears,  shrink  little  from  any  perversion 
of  the  form,  or  even  of  the  sense,  of  language.  This 
is  particularly  true  of  the  poets  who  preceded  Dry- 
den  ;  but  even  Tennyson,  In  his  most  carefully  finished 
poem,  "  In  Memoriam,"  writes  thus  :  — 

"  Then  echo-like  our  voices  rang ; 
We  sung,  tho'  every  eye  was  dim, 
A  merry  song  we  sang  with  him 
Last  year  ;  impetuously  we  sang." 

XXX. 

To  turn  to  prose  writers,  there  Is  hardly  any  con- 
fusion or  mutilation  of  the  preterite  or  the  perfect 
participle  that  is  not  supported  by  the  "  authority " 
of  Swift,  who,  in  the  "  Tale  of  a  Tub,"  has  "  they 
writ  and  sung  "  for  they  wrote  and  sang ;  "  if  a  cruel 
king  had  not  arose,^''  for  had  not  arisen  ;  "  the  trea- 
tises wrote"  for  written  :  for  all  of  which  his  author- 
ity has  just  as  much  weight  as  it  has  for  such  a  use  of 
language  as  "  the  perfection  of  writing  correct^"  which 
we  find  in  the  same  book,  and  which  does  not  exhibit 
the  perfection  of  writing  correctly.  Because  Gibbon 
produces  such  a  passage  as  this,  — 

"  Either  a  pestilence  or  a  famine,  a  victory  or  a  defeat,  an 
oracle  of  the  gods  or  the  eloquence  of  a  daring  leader,  were 
sufficient  to  impel  the  Gothic  arms,"  — 


"JUS  ET  NORMA   LOQUENDI "  379 

and  Junius  such  a  one  as  this,  — 

*^  Neither  Charles  nor  his  brother  ivere  qualified  to  support 
such  a  system,"  — 

are  we  to  take  their  authority  as  a  justification  of  the 
use  of  either  and  neither  with  wei^e  ?  Here  follow 
three  passages  from  eminent  writers ;  the  first  from 
Macaiday's  "  Essay  on  Milton,"  the  second  from  the 
same  writer's  "  History  of  England,"  the  third  from 
Junius's  "  Letters  to  Woodfall  "  :  — 

"  Skinner,  it  is  well  known,  held  the  same  political  opinions 
with  his  illustrious  friend." 

"  During  the  last  century  no  prime  minister  has  become  rich  in 
office." 

"  This  paper  should  properly  have  appeared  to-morrow." 

Does  the  eminence  of  the  writers  make  such  a  use  of 
language  authoritative  ?  Certainly  not.  Here  reason 
comes  in  and  sets  aside  the  weight  of  authority,  how- 
ever eminent.  Either  and  neither  are  essentially 
separative,  and  therefore  they  cannot  be  correctly  used 
with  plural  verbs.  Same  expresses  identity,  and  there- 
fore cannot  properly  be  used  in  correspondence  to 
with.,  which  means  nearness,  contact,  and  implies  du- 
ality, severalness.  The  last  century  is  time  com- 
pletely past,  to  express  events  in  which,  a  present  per- 
fect verb  cannot  be  logically  used.  Have  aiJ'peared 
expresses  a  perfected  action,  and  therefore  it  cannot 
be  correctly  predicated  of  something  in  the  future,  — 
to-morrow. 

The  taking  of  isolated  passages  from  the  works  of 
eminent  writers,  as  examples  of  a  use  of  language 
which  has  their  sanction,  is  not  to  be  defended.  It  is 
unfair,  unreasonable ;  for  writers,  like  other  men,  are 
to  be  judged  by  their  general  practice,  not  by  the  oc- 
casional lapses  to  which  they,  like  all  other  men,  are 


380  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

subject.  And  it  is  in  part  to  illustrate  the  unsound- 
ness of  conclusions  drawn  from  such  rare  or  solitary- 
instances  that  these  examples  are  here  brought  for- 
ward. It  is  too  common  to  see  an  abnormal  or  illoai- 
cal  use  of  language  defended  on  the  ground  that  it 
may  be  found  in  the  writings  of  some  author  of  de- 
served reputation. 

As  the  example  of  eminent  writers,  when  it  is  in- 
consistent with  reason  and  analogy,  is  not  authorita- 
tive, so  good  usage,  that  is,  continuous  use  by  writers 
of  repute  and  people  of  culture,  is  not  necessary  to 
the  recognition  of  a  word  or  a  phrase  as  good  English. 
A  good  new  word  brings  its  own  credentials,  and  is  as 
good  English  the  first  day  that  it  is  spoken  or  written 
as  after  a  hundred  years  of  the  best  usage.  But  it  is 
also  true  that  many  a  bad  word,  like  many  a  bad  man, 
is  well  received  and  must  be  recognized  merely  be- 
cause it  has  forced  its  way  among  its  betters,  and  has 
^een  adopted  for  convenience'  sake.  It  is  enough  if 
the  new  word  is  normally  formed  upon  a  sound  stem 
and  conveys  its  intended  meaning  clearly.  For  exam- 
ple, the  word  streeted,  which  I  have  previously  cited 
as  having  been  used  by  James  Howell  in  his  "  Let- 
ters," and  probably  never  before  or  since,  is  good  Eng- 
lish, not  because  he  was  a  writer  of  uncommon  power 
or  purity,  which  he  was  not,  but  because  it  is  formed 
aijcording  to  a  law  (so  to  speak)  which  permits  the 
formation  of  adjectives  participial  in  form  from  nouns, 
and  which  has  come  down  to  us  from  the  Anglo-Saxon. 
Thus,  in  Wyatt's  "  Request  of  Cupid  "  :  — 

"  Weaponed  thou  art,  and  slie  unarmed  sitteth." 

'W^eaponed,  although  unheard  in  these  days,  is  good 
English  now,  was  good  English  when  Wyatt  used  it 


"JUS  ET  NORMA  LOQUENDl"  381 

three  hundred  and  twenty-five  years  ago,  and  would 
have  been  good  English  then  even  if  six  hundred  years 
before  rcaepcned  had  not  meant  male,  i.  e.,  weapon- 
bearing.  If  it  were  used  to-day  for  the  first  time,  it 
would  be  as  good  English,  as  utterly  beyond  reproach 
or  exception,  as  if  it  had  continued  in  constant  use 
these  thousand  years. 

In  Mr.  Lowell's  "  Cathedral  "  a  word  occurs,  undis- 
jyrivacied^  which  when  the  poem  appeared  was  made 
the  occasion  of  many  sneers  from  philological  witlings. 
It  probably  had  never  been  used  before,  and  therefore 
those  purists  denounced  it  as  a  neologism.  So  it  is,  in 
the  newness  of  its  form,  but  not  in  the  essence  of  its 
formation.  It  is  good  English,  but  not  because  Mr. 
Lowell  used  it.  His  use  would  not  make  undispriva- 
cied  English  any  more  than  it  could  do  the  same  for 
proven.  It  is  English  because  its  meaning  is  clear 
and  its  formation  normal.  Its  meaning  is,  —  has 
not  been  robbed  of  privacy ;  and  it  is  as  correctly 
formed  as  undisturbed.  I  do  not  know  whether  Mr. 
Lowell  hesitated  to  use  the  word  in  question,  but  I 
am  pretty  sure  that  he  did  not.  No  man  who  felt  in 
him  any  mastery  of  language  would  be  likely  to  hesi- 
tate a  moment  over  such  a  word.  But  the  fact  is,  that 
he  approached  it  gradually.  He  did  not  begin  with 
2)rivacied,  which,  although  unknown  to  dictionaries,  is 
perfectly  good  English,  meaning  possessed  of  privacy. 
But,  assuming  privacled,  he  wrote  in  the  "  Fable  for 
Critics  :  "  — 

"  But  now,  on  the  poet's  disprivacied  moods, 
With  do  this  and  do  that  the  pert  critic  intrudes." 

Disprivacied  is  as  unknown  to  dictionaries  as  jjri- 
vacied  or  undisprivacied  ;  but  its  meaning  —  having 
bad  privacy  taken  away  —  is  clear,  and  its  formation 


382  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

is  as  normal  as  that  of  dlsprized  or  disgusted.     Then 
came  the  double  prefix  in  the  "  Cathedral "  :  — 

"  Play  with  his  child,  make  love,  and  shriek  his  mind, 
By  throngs  of  strangers  undisprivacied." 

It  may  be  asked,  As  tin  here  merely  cancels  the 
dis  to  which  it  is  prefixed,  how  does  undisprivacied 
differ  from  privacied,  and  what  necessity  justifies  the 
use  of  the  former  ?  To  this  the  reply  is,  that  although 
the  tm  merely  cancels  the  dis^  there  is  in  disprivacied 
a  suggestion  of  an  active  and  unpleasant  taking  away 
of  privacy,  and  that  therefore  an  undis^jrivacied  man 
is  one  who  has  escaped  that  injury  from  those  who  are 
willing  to  inflict  it,  while  in  jjrivacied  there  is  no  such 
implication.  All  this  comes  at  once  by  intuition  to 
men  who  are  masterful  in  language,  or  ready  and  true 
in  its  apprehension. 

Another  author  of  high  and  well-deserved  repute, 
Mr.  Charles  Reade,  affords  an  example  of  the  unique 
use  of  a  word  apparently  formed  in  a  mood  similar 
to  that  which  led  Mr.  Lowell  to  undisprivacied,  but 
which  is  really  formed  upon  an  exactly  opposite  prin- 
ciple. In  that  charming  story,  "  Peg  Woffington," 
there  is  this  passage  :  — 

"Mrs.  Vane  .  .  .  wore  a  thick  mantle  and  a  hood  that  con- 
cealed her  features.     Of  these  Triplet  disbarrassed  her." 

Chapter  XIII. 

Now  disbarrassed  is  not  English,  and  never  could 
be,  except  in  virtue  of  a  usage  to  which  it  quite  surely 
will  never  attain.  The  word  is  made  on  the  assump- 
tion that  as  em  Qi.  e.,  in  or  on),  combined  with  bar- 
rass,  conveys  the  idea  of  personal  encumbrance,  dis 
(i.  e.,  away,  from)  prefixed  to  the  same  stem  would 
convey  the  opposite  meaning.     But  the  fault  in  this 


"JUS   ET   NORMA   LOQUENDI  "  383 

formation  is,  that  there  is  no  such  English  stem  a.s 
ban^ass,  nor  can  such  a  stem  be  properly  assumed, 
as  in  the  case  of  jjrivacicd.  Our  woi-d  eT7iharrass  is 
adopted,  as  a  whole,  directly  from  the  French  ;  and 
it,  as  a  whole,  conveys  a  simple  idea,  that  of  encum- 
brance, the  reverse  of  which  must  be  expressed  by 
disembarrassed.  Not  because  it  is  new,  but  because 
it  is  obscure  and  badly  formed,  disbarassed  must  be 
rejected,  although  it  is  found  in  perhaps  the  best  book 
of  an  English  novelist  whose  vivid  style  and  creative 
genius  will  secure  his  works  a  fame  that  will  endure 
when  the  memory  of  men  who  use  language  much 
more  correctly  will  be  forgotten.  Undis2)rivacled 
would  be  English  if,  instead  of  being  first  used  by 
the  author  of  the  "  Commemoration  Ode "  and  the 
"  Biglow  Papers,"  it  had  been  introduced  in  the  re- 
porting columns  of  a  penny  newspaper.  These  two 
neologisms,  similar  in  kind  and  purpose,  brought  for- 
ward by  two  writers  of  eminence,  under  similar  cir- 
cumstances, have  a  directly  diverse  fate. 

A  finer  example  of  the  introduction  of  a  sound, 
good,  new,  and  purely  English  word  could  not  be 
found  than  in  the  following  passage  in  Doctor  John 
C.  Peters's  paper  on  "  Pathology  and  Therapeu- 
tics :  "  — 

"  Again,  to  a  starving  person  we  would  first  administer  homceo- 
jifithlcally  such  small  quantities  of  food  as  would  enhunger,  if 
not  almost  starve,  a  hearty  person." 

Dr.  Peters  has  such  well-won  eminence  as  a  phy- 
sician that  he  can  afford  to  have  it  said  that,  notwith- 
standing the  generally  clear  and  correct  style  of  his 
medical  writings,  he  has  not  the  authority  in  litera- 
ture that  he  has  in  medicine.  Enhunger  receives  no 
literary  sanction  from  his  use  of  it ;  but,  although  it 


384  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

seems  (strangely,  I  must  confess)  never  to  have  been 
used  before,  it  has  as  robust  an  English  constitution 
as  any  word  in  the  Bible  or  in  Shakespeare. 

It  is  chiefly  to  those  debauchers  of  thought  and 
defilers  of  language,  the  newspapers,  that  we  owe  the 
vei'bal  abominations  that  are  creeping  (nay,  rather 
rushing)  into  common  use,  —  use  unhappily  not  always 
confined  to  those  who  inaugurate  "  sample-rooms,"  or 
assist  at  those  solemn  rites.  Nor  are  these  hideous 
excrescences  upon  our  mother  tongue  confined  to  the 
reporter's  columns.  In  the  correspondence  of  a  paper 
of  high  position  —  correspondence  not  without  evi- 
dence of  fine  appreciation  and  of  some  literary  taste, 
that  is  the  worst  of  it  —  I  met  with  this  sentence 
about  Pompeii :  — 

"  Even  now,  when  the  city  has  been  dead,  buried  eighteen  hun- 
dred years,  and  resurrectionized,  one  is  startled  by  an  air  of  gay- 
ety  that  clings  to  it." 

This  is  bad  enough,  worse  if  possible  than  its  fore- 
runner, resurrected ;  but  what  shall  be  said  of  the  sin 
of  the  writer  of  the  following  passage  in  a  leading 
article  in  a  journal  of  the  very  highest  position  in  the 
country :  — 

"  And  what  are  the  misnomered  Republicans  doing  but  seeking 
to  perpetuate  in  the  Southern  States  the  social  nuisance  of  class 
distinctions  ?  " 

What  social  nuisance  could  be  greater  than  a  news- 
paper which  deliberately  sets  before  fifty  thousand 
readers  —  unsuspecting,  receptive,  and  confiding  — 
the  printed  example  of  the  use  of  such  an  execrable 
compound  as  misnomered  f  By  what  process  did  a 
man  who  has  been  able  to  command  the  right  to  use 
a  ]pen  in  the  leading  columns  of  a  first-rate  journal 


"JUS  ET  NORMA  LOQUENDI"  386 

reach  that  depth  of  degradation  in  language,  com- 
pared to  which  cant  is  classical  and  slang  elegant  ? 
He  meant  misnamed ;  nothing  more  or  less.  But 
because  he  must  have  "finer  bread  than  is  made  of 
wheat,"  and  because  there  is  a  noun  'mis7iomcr,  he 
makes  from  it  that  hideous  verb.  Now  again  it  is 
to  be  observed  that  resurrectionized  and  misnomered 
are  not  outcasts  because  they  lack  the  sanction  of 
usage  or  the  authority  of  eminent  writers.  They  are 
no  newer,  nor  less  sanctioned  by  use,  good  or  bad, 
rude  or  cultured,  than  undisprivacied  or  streeted  or 
enhu7igered,  no  stranger  to  the  common  ear  than 
weaponed.  But  the  latter  are  sound  and  healthy 
growths ;  the  former  are  fungi,  monstrous  and  pes- 
tilent. 

Long-established  usage  not  being  an  essential  con- 
dition to  the  recognition  of  a  word  or  a  phrase  as  cor- 
rect English,  does  such  usage  of  itself  make  that 
correct  which  will  not  bear  the  tests  of  reason  and 
analogy?  Observation  justifies  the  answer  that  it 
does  not.  Latham's  judgment  —  that  as  whatever  is, 
in  language,  is  right,  whatever  was  and  is  not,  was 
wrong  —  is  unsound  ;  not  only  unsound  in  its  conclu- 
sion, but  incorrect  in  its  premise.  In  language,  as  in 
every  other  manifestation  of  man's  intellectual  and 
moral  nature,  that  which  is  may  be  wrong ;  and  that 
which  was  and  is  not  may  have  been  right.  Owing 
to  the  peculiar  function  of  language  as  the  only 
means  of  communication  between  man  and  man, 
whatever  is  must  be  accepted,  in  a  certain  degree  at 
least.  A  writer  or  speaker  cannot  be  justly  censured, 
as  for  a  personal  fault,  because  he  uses  words  and 
phrases  which  are  current  in  his  day.  But  custom 
has  thus  sanctioned  not  a  little,  in  all  languages,  the 


386  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

incorrectness  of  which  is  discernible,  and  has  been 
discerned,  not  only  by  the  critical  and  the  highly 
cultured,  but  by  men  of  ordinary  intelligence  and  of 
not  more  than  ordinary  carefulness  or  carelessness  in 
speech.  The  mere  fact  that  a  word  or  a  phrase  has 
long  been  in  good  and  in  general  use  is  presumptive 
evidence  in  its  favor,  and  therefore  a  complete  justi- 
fication of  its  use  by  any  individual,  but  not  proof 
that  it  is  a  normal  product  of  the  language  of  which 
it  practically  forms  a  part.  Words  and  phrases  come 
into  being,  we  hardly  know  how ;  and,  quickly  caught 
up  from  one  to  another,  they  pass  into  use  unchal- 
lenged, and,  good  or  bad,  right  or  wrong,  soon  become 
fixed  as  recognized  parts  of  speech.  Rarely  is  there 
such  reluctance  as  there  was  two  hundred  and  fifty 
years  ago  in  regard  to  its,  or  such  protracted  aversion 
and  discussion  as  there  has  been  of  late  in  regard  to 
is  being}    But,  in  this  way,  words  and  forms  of  speech 

^  This  "  continuiug  passive  present "  seems  to  be  fastened 
upon  us  ;  those  who  inaugurate  "  sample-rooms,"  or  who  report 
the  proceedings  on  those  occasions,  being  instant  in  its  use, 
and  seizing  every  opportunity  of  airing  their  precision.  In  the 
report  of  a  case  of  a  forlorn  damsel,  I  have  met  "  while  she 
was  being  paid  attention  to,"  instead  of  while  she  was  made 
love  to,  or,  while  she  was  courted  ;  elsewhere,  "  while  this  nar- 
rative was  being  proceeded  with,"  instead  of  while  this  story 
was  told  ;  and,  "  the  Democrats  of  Kentucky  are  being  much 
exercised  at  a  prospective  failure,"  etc. ;  and,  even  in  the  London 
Spectator,  "  Precisely  the  same  scene  in  a  milder  form  is  being 
witnessed  before  Paris."  The  following  passage  from  a  leading 
article  in  a  New  York  journal  clearly  illustrates  the  peculiar  ab- 
surdity of  this  phrase  :  — 

"  History  has  never  moved  with  strides  more  gigantic  than 
she  has  done  during  the  six  weeks  just  closed,  and  behind  the 
encircling  walls  and  bristling  cannon  of  Paris  there  may  at  this 
moment  be  transacting  a  more  momentous  drama  than  has  been 
Been  there  since  the  coup  d'etat  of  1851,  and  a  more  imposing 


"JUS   ET   NORMA   LOQUENDI"  387 

creep  into  use  which,  although  they  are  not  idioms, 
cannot  be  justified  by  either  reason  or  analogy. 

Neologism  is  not  reprehensible  if  the  deviation 
from  precedent  is  in  the  line  of  normal  movement; 
which  is  a  very  different  matter,  for  instance,  from 
the  substitution  of  one  part  of  speech  for  another. 
The  preterites  and  participles  of  the  strong  verbs 
again  furnish  us  with  apt  illustrations.  The  original 
formation  of  the  past  participle  of  those  verbs  is  in 
en,  as  ride,  rode,  ridden;  but  the  language  in  its 
tendency  to  contraction  and  simplification  has  been 
steadily,  although  very  slowly,  dro})ping  this  syllable. 
For  example,^/f<7A^,  fought,  foucjlit^eii),  drink,  dranh, 
drnnlcQeii),  get,  gat,  got{teii),  begin,  began,  begun- 
(jien^,  to  which  category  might  consistently  be  added 
write,  rcrote,  iorit(ten').  Therefore,  /  have  writ  is 
normal ;  and  the  question  between  writ  as  a  past  par- 
ticiple and  written  is  merely  one  of  usage.  But  the 
use  of  icrit  as  a  preterite,  and  that  of  wrote  as  a  par- 
ticiple, have  no  such  justification.  Both  are  abnor- 
mal and  monstrous.  Yet  those  perversions  have  the 
support  of  such  eminent  writers  as  Addison  and  Pope, 
Swift,  Prior,  and  Sterne.     Addison  has,  "  I  remember 

one  than  has  been  witnessed  since  the  head  of  a  king  went  down 
as  the  gage  of  Rattle  to  a  confederation  of  kings.  '  What  will 
they  say  in  Paris  ? '  is  to-day  in  every  one's  mouth,  while  the 
answer  is  being  flashed  across  to  serve  for  to-morrow's  admira- 
tion or  blame." 

The  writer  felt  that  it  became  him  to  say  "  is  being  flashed 
across,"  but  just  before  he  had  written  "  tliere  may  be  trans- 
acting," and  not,  there  may  be  being  transacted,  which,  according 
to  the  formula,  is  absolutely  required.  Is  heing  was  very  well, 
and  more  than  well,  it  was  fine  ;  but  he  instinctively  shrank 
from  he  being,  and  yet  in  that  is  the  gist  of  this  whole  ques* 
\ion. 


388  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

two  young  fellows  who  ritZ,"  etc.  ("  Spectator,"  No. 
152) ;  and  Pope,  "  statesmen  farces  writ,^^  and  of 
course  the  Pope-lings  all  wrote  in  the  same  fashion, 
which,  indeed,  was  very  prevalent  in  the  last  cen- 
tury among  the  most  eminent  writers  and  cultivated 
people. 

But  there  are  phrases  and  forms  of  expression 
which  have  been  in  use  for  centuries  among  both  the 
learned  and  the  ignorant,  the  cultured  and  the  rude, 
and  which  have  passed  or  are  passing  out  of  use,  not 
by  way  of  an  unthinking  conformity  to  capricious 
fashion,  but  because  of  a  perception  that  they  are  at 
variance  with  reason.  One  of  these  is  the  double 
negative  which,  by  Anglo-Saxon  and  early  English 
speakers  and  writers,  was  universally  used  to  strengthen 
a  negation.  It  may  be  that  the  change  was  in  a 
measure  due  to  the  attempt  to  construct  a  grammar  of 
the  English  language  upon  that  of  the  Latin,  in  which 
two  negatives  were  equivalent  to  an  affirmative.  But 
it  seems  to  me  that  it  was  chiefly  owing  to  a  deliber- 
ate conformity  to  the  requirements  of  logic,  which  in 
the  process  of  time  was  inevitable,  and  which,  once 
attained,  will  never  be  abandoned  until  language 
comes  to  be  informed  by  the  rule  of  unreason.  If 
"  There  is  not  any  reason  "  predicates  the  entire  ab- 
sence of  reason,  surely  "  There  is  not  no  reason  "  pre- 
dicates exactly  the  reverse.  The  case,  instead  of  being 
at  all  high,  subtle,  or  mysterious,  seems  to  be  one  of 
the  simplest  that  can  be  put  before  any  reasonable 
creature.  It  is  even  stronger  than  that  as  to  the 
double  superlative,  which  went  out,  in  company  with 
the  double  negative,  about  the  beginning  of  the  sev- 
enteenth century.  For  as  to  the  double  superlative 
the  question  is  almost  one  of  mere  superfluity.     Look 


"JUS  ET  NORMA  LOQUENDI"  389 

for  a  moment  at  this  passage  in  Bishop  Tunstall's 
Palm  Sunday  Sermon  (a.  d.  1539),  a  piece  of  Eng- 
lish well  worth  study  :  — 

"  It  was  harde  suffering  that  He  suffered  for  wicked  men.  It 
was  more  barde  that  He  suffered  of  wicked  men.  And  the  most 
hardest  of  all  was  that  He  suffered  with  wicked  men." 

When  Tunstall  wrote,  it  was  the  custom  to  double 
the  comparative  as  well  as  the  superlative.  But  here 
we  have  "  more  hard,"  and  yet  "  most  hardest."  Now 
can  there  be  a  doubt  that  if  more  hard  expresses 
the  comparative  degree,  most  hard  equally  expresses 
the  superlative  ?  and,  vice  versa,  that  if  the  learned 
and  clear-headed  Tunstall  was  right  in  writing  ?7io6t 
hardest,  he  was  wrong,  or  at  least  insufficient,  in  writ- 
ing more  hard?  We  may  be  sure  that  it  is  owing 
to  such  perception  and  such  reasoning,  first  on  the 
part  of  careful  and  thoughtful  writers,  —  who  gener- 
ally do,  in  very  deed,  evolve  their  language  from  the 
depths  of  their  own  consciousness,  although  some 
are  content  with  fishing  theirs  from  the  shallows  of 
usage,  —  and  afterwards  on  the  part  of  the  cultivated, 
and  then  of  people  in  general,  that  the  use  of  the 
double  comparative  and  superlative,  as  well  as  of 
the  double  negative,  disappeared  from  English  speech. 

Under  a  like  influence  of  reason,  another  old  usage 
has  given  up  its  hold  on  the  language,  and  we  may  be 
sure  forever,  —  the  separation  of  the  limiting  adjective 
from  the  word  which  it  modifies.  Thus  Bunyan  makes 
Interpreter's  minstrel  sing,  "  The  Lord  is  only  my 
support."  Now  Bunyan  meant  not  that  the  Lord 
was  nothing  but  a  support  to  the  singer,  but  either 
that  the  Lord  and  none  other  was  his  support,  or 
that  the  Lord  was  his  single  and  sufficient  support. 


390  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

Nowadays  we  write  more  correctly,  The  Lord  only  is 
my  support,  or  The  Lord  is  my  only  support ;  both  of 
which  phrases  express  one  fact  indeed,  but  not  the 
same  conception  of  the  fact.  The  former  use  of  only^ 
and  similar  adjectives,  was  the  general  one,  even  in 
literature,  until  a  comparatively  recent  period,  and  a 
remnant  of  it  still  exists  in  common  speech.  Shake- 
speare even  makes  a  page  in  "  As  You  Like  It  "  say 
that  hawking  and  spitting,  and  saying  we  are  hoarse, 
are  "  the  only  prologues  to  a  bad  voice,"  an  assertion 
seeming  so  absurdly  at  variance  with  the  fact  that  I 
was  tempted  to  transpose  only  and  read  "only  the 
prologues  to  a  bad  voice."  But  Shakespeare,  I  am 
sure,  wrote  "  the  only,"  etc.,  according  to  the  inexact 
usasre  of  his  time.  So  we  hear  now  sensible,  educated 
farmer  folk  say,  "  That  is  most  an  excellent  apple  " 
(I  heard  it  but  a  short  time  ago),  or  "  That  was  most 
a  capital  sermon,"  instead  of  a  most  excellent,  a  most 
capital.  And,  in  old  sermons  and  moral  essays,  phrases 
like  "  so  oft  to  wallowe  in  such  his  wickednesse  "  are 
common.  Modern  usage,  which  requires  that  the  ad- 
jective, or  modifying  word  or  phrase,  shall  not  be 
separated  from  the  word  or  phrase  which  it  modifies, 
is  a  deliberate  conformity  to  the  characteristic  logical 
structure  of  the  English  sentence. 

Another  phrase  "  sanctioned  "  by  universal  usage 
is  disappearing  under  our  eyes  at  this  day  before  the 
advance  of  reason,  —  whether  or  no.  It  is  now  seen, 
to  cite  for  instance  an  old  story,  that  there  will  be 
Divine  service  at  this  meeting-house  on  next  Wednes- 
day evening  whether  [it  rains]  or  [rains]  not ;  and 
therefore  whether  or  no  is  doomed.  Now,  fifty  or  a 
hundred  or  two  hundred  years  ago,  whether  or  not 
would  have  been  the  correct  form  and  good  English, 


«'JUS  ET  NORMA  LOQUENDI"  391 

just  as  it  is  now,  although  whether  or  no,  being  in 
universal  use,  was  admissible. 

Yet  another  example  of  the  so-called  authoritative 
misuse  of  language  is  the  use  of  had  in  the  phrases, 
/  had  rather.  You  had  better.  This  has  the  sanction 
of  usage  for  centuries,  not  only  by  the  English-speak- 
ing people  generally,  but  by  their  greatest  and  most 
careful  writers.  Nothing,  however,  among  the  few 
enduring  certainties  of  language,  is  more  certain  than 
that  had  expresses  perfected  and  past  possession. 
How,  then,  consistently  with  reason,  and  with  its  con- 
stant and  universally  accepted  meaning  in  every  other 
connection,  can  it  be  used  to  express  future  action  ? 
A  perception  of  this  incongruity,  and  a  consequent 
uneasiness  as  to  the  use  of  these  phrases,  is  becoming 
common,  and  it  is  safe  to  say  that  they  will,  ere  long, 
begin  to  be  dropped  in  favor  of  a  more  logical  and 
self-consistent  phraseology.  Had  rather  will  proba- 
bly yield  to  would  rather,  and  had  better  to  might 
better.  In  like  position  is  the  use  of  the  present  per- 
fect and  the  perfect  infinitive,  thus :  If  I  had  have 
done,  I  was  ready  to  have  gone,  which  is  supported 
by  the  best  usage  of  centuries.  Bishop  Jewell  writes, 
"  the  church  was  ready  to  have  fallen."  There  seems 
to  be  no  doubt  that  this  is  logically  incorrect.  Jew- 
ell meant  that  the  church  was  ready  to  fall;  we  should 
say.  If  I  had  done,  I  was  ready  to  go  ;  and  we  may 
be  sure  that,  ere  long,  this  phraseology  will  be  delib- 
erately substituted  for  the  other  on  logical  grounds. 

I  pass  over  right  away  in  the  sense  of  immediately, 
which  is  in  common  use  here  among  the  most  culti- 
vated people,  merely  with  the  mention  of  it  as  alto- 
gether unjustifiable  on  any  ground,  and  as  having 
no  affinity  with  straightway/.     It  is  an  undoubtable 


392  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

Americanism,  —  one  of  the  very  few  words  or  phrases, 
not  slang,  which  can  be  properly  so  called.  Different 
to  is  as  exclusively  British.  It  has  come  into  use  since 
the  Commonwealth  and  the  Restoration,  and  it  per- 
vades British  speech  and  literature  even  of  the  high- 
est class,  producing  such  combinations  as  the  follow- 
ing:— 

"  The  words  la  maniere  Gottica  appear  to  have  been  first  ap- 
plied, by  Italian  writers,  to  distinguish  the  previous  style  of 
architectiu'e  to  that  then  in  vogue."  —  London  Athenceum,  No- 
vember 9,  1859. 

"  It  is  true  that  England  stands  to  America,  in  point  of  power, 
something  different  to  that  of  Athens  to  the  Rome  of  Cicero."  — 
London  Spectator,  November  25,  1865. 

A  word  used  in  both  countries,  but  more  commonly 
with  us,  lengthy^  is  a  marked  example  illustrating 
my  present  position.  It  is  illogical,  at  variance  with 
analogy,  and  it  is  entirely  needless,  as  it  has  usurped 
—  who  knows  how  or  why  ?  —  the  rightful  place  of  a 
good  and  well-connected  English  word,  which  does 
properly  express  that  which  lengthy  expresses  only  on 
sufferance,  and  by  reason  of  general  but  unjustifiable 
usage.  And  yet  even  Mr.  Lowell  not  only  uses  it 
but  speaks  well  of  it,  as  a  word  "  civilly  compromis- 
ing between  long  and  tedious^''  which  we  have 
"given  back  to  England."  It  is  true  that  English 
does  need  such  a  word,  and  therefore  had  it  before 
there  could  have  been  Americanisms.  For  did  not 
Puritan  sermons  precede  Presidents'  messages  ?  Ad- 
jectives expressing  likeness  in  quality  are  formed  in 
English  from  immaterial  nouns,  by  a  suffix  which 
would  have  at  once  occurred  to  Mr.  Lowell  if  he 
had  used,  instead  of  the  Romance  word  tedious,  the 
Anglo-Saxon   wearisome   or   tiresome.      The  family 


"JUS  ET  NORMA  LOQUENDI "  393 

is  numerous,  —  lonesorne,  wholesome,  irhsome,  hand- 
somCy  loathsome,  frolicsome,  burdensome,  and  the 
like.  And  so  from  Anglo-Saxon  times  to  very  mod- 
ern days  we  have  had  the  analogous  word  Jomjsome, 
meaning  so  long  as  to  be  almost  wearisome  or  tedious. 
It  is  common  with  the  Elizabethan  writers,  so  well 
known  to  Mr.  Lowell,  and  Prior  is  cited  for  its  use 
by  Webster,  Bishop  Hall,  in  his  "  Defence  of  the 
Humble  Remonstrance,"  writes  :  "  They  have  had  so 
little  mercy  on  him  as  to  put  him  to  the  penance  of 
their  longsome  volume."  It  is  manifest  that  writers 
who  use  wearisome,  irksome,  and  hurdensome  can 
have  no  consistent  objection  to  longsome,  which  has 
long  and  eminent  usage  in  its  favor,  and  which  Mr. 
Lowell  might  well  bring  up  again,  as  Tennyson  has 
brought  up  rathe.  The  objection  to  lengthy  seems  to 
be  well  taken.  As  to  our  having  given  the  latter 
back  to  England,  it  may  be  said  that  an  instance  of 
the  use  of  the  word  before  England  gave  her  people 
and  her  language  to  America  has  not  yet  been  pro- 
duced, and,  according  to  my  observation,  does  not 
exist. 

Another  error  common  among  cultivated  writers 
and  speakers  is  the  use  of  adverbs  with  the  verb  to 
look,  as,  He  looked  wretchedly.  She  looked  beautifully. 
It  might  as  well  be  said  that  the  grass  looks  greenly, 
or  the  man  looks  bluely.  A  man  who  lives  wretch- 
edly will  probably  look  wretched  ;  a  woman  who  is 
formed  and  dressed  beautifully  will  look  beautiful. 
The  error  is  the  consequence  of  a  confusion  of  looh 
in  the  sense  to  direct  the  eye,  and  looh  in  the  sense  of 
to  seem,  to  appear.  The  same  persons  who  say  that 
a  man  looked  wretchedly,  or  a  woman  looked  beauti- 
fully, would  not  say  that  he  seemed  wretchedly,  or  slio 


394  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

seemed  beautifully.  In  the  phrases,  He  looked  well. 
She  seemed  ill,  ivell  and  ill  are  not  really  adverbs. 
Such  phrases  as,  I  had  rather.  You  had  better,  Had 
have  done.  Ready  to  have  fallen,  Right  away.  Differ- 
ent to,  and  Looked  wretchedly,  have,  it  need  hardly 
be  said,  nothing  in  common  with  such  as.  We  made 
the  land.  The  ship  stood  up  the  bay,  He  took  his  jour- 
ney (Jewell  writes  "  tooke  his  progresse  "),  They  came 
in  thick.  He  took  her  to  wife,  A  house  hard  by.  He 
took  up  with  her,  He  did  it  out  of  hand,  I  won't  put  up 
with  it.  Given  to  hospitality.  Stricken  in  years.  The 
latter  are  truly  idiomatic,  and  generally  metaphorical ; 
and,  although  they  defy  analysis,  they  are  not,  like 
the  former,  at  variance  with  themselves  and  defiant  of 
reason. 

This  healthy  tendency  toward  logical  correctness 
in  language  is  liable  to  perversion ;  a  perversion  to 
which  we  owe  such  phrases  as  "  is  being  built,"  and 
"  written  over  the  signature."  The  former  is  due  to 
an  inability  to  perceive  that  a  word  formed  upon  a 
verb  by  the  suffix  ing  (c.  </.,  huilding^  may  be  either 
a  verbal  noun  or  a  participle,  and  have  a  passive  or 
an  active  signification,  according  to  its  place  in  the 
sentence  and  the  words  with  which  it  is  connected, 
and  that  the  combination  of  the  present  participle 
with  the  perfect  (e.  g.,  being  huilt,  hamng  heen')  logi- 
cally expresses  action  or  being  which  is  complete  at 
the  time  spoken  of.  The  latter  is  the  product  of  a 
prim  and  narrow  righteousness  of  mind  incapable 
of  sympathy  with  that  free,  figurative  use  of  words 
which  gives  strength  and  richness  to  much  of  the 
daily  speech  of  simple  folk,  and  which  is  so  char- 
acteristic of  the  nervous  and  vivid  i3liraseoIogy  of  the 
Elizabethan  period.    Both  these  incapacities  are  illus- 


"JUS   ET  NORMA   LOQUENDl  "  39S 

trated  in  the  following  dialogue.  It  is  said  to  have 
taken  place  somewhere  in  Massachusetts,  and  it  was 
published  in  the  newspaper  from  which  I  quote  it 
"  for  the  benefit  of  grammarians." 

Old  Gentleman.  —  "  Are  there  any  houses  building  in  your  vil- 
lage ?  " 

Young  Lady.  —  "  No,  sir.  There  is  a  new  house  being  built 
for  Mr.  Smith,  but  it  is  the  carpenters  who  are  building." 

Gendeman.  —  "  True  ;  I  sit  corrected.  To  be  building  is  cer- 
tainly a  different  thing  from  to  be  being  built.  And  how  long 
has  Mr.  Smith's  house  been  being  built  ?  " 

Lady.  —  (Looks  puzzled  a  moment,  au^.  then  answers  rather 
abruptly.)     "  Nearly  a  year." 

Gendeman.  —  "  How  much  longer  do  you  think  it  will  be  being 
built  ?  " 

Lady.  —  (Explosively.)     "  Don't  know." 

Gendeman.  —  "I  should  think  Mr.  Smith  would  be  annoyed 
by  its  being  so  long  being  built  ;  for,  the  house  he  now  occupies 
being  old,  he  must  leave  it,  and  the  new  one  being  only  being 
built,  instead  of  being  built  as  he  expected,  he  cannot "  — 

At  this  point,  it  is  said,  the  young  lady  disappeared  ; 
and  here  I  return  from  my  digression. 

If,  then,  novelty  is  not  a  tenable  ground  of  objec- 
tion to  a  word  or  a  phrase,  and  long  usage  is  not  in 
itself  full  justification,  and  if  the  example  of  writers 
eminent  for  the  instruction  or  the  pleasure  they  give 
is  not  authoritative  when  they  disregard  reason  and 
analogy,  what  is  the  rule  or  standard  by  which  lan- 
guage may  be  tested,  and  the  appeal  to  which  is  final  ? 
The  question  is  answered  in  the  putting  of  it.  There 
is  no  such  absolute  rule.  Usage  gives  immunity  to 
use ;  but  the  court  that  pronounces  judgment  upon 
language  is  a  mixed  commission  of  the  common  and 
the  critical,  before  whom  precedent  and  good  usage 
have  presumptive  authority,  on  the  condition  that 
ihey  can  bear  the  test  of  criticism,  that  is,  of  reason. 


396  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

To  that  test  they  are  continually  subjected,  and  before 
it  they  are  compelled  frequently  to  give  way.  Usage 
is  not  a  guarantee  of  correctness  ;  criticism  is  incapa- 
ble of  creation.  By  the  former,  acting  instinctively, 
language  is  produced  and  has  its  life.  By  the  latter, 
it  is  wrought  toward  a  logical  precision  and  symme- 
trical completeness,  which  it  constantly  approximates, 
but  which,  owing  to  its  unstable  nature  and  the  un- 
controllable influences  to  which  it  yields,  it  can  never 
perfectly  attain. 


CONCLUSION 

It  is  not  for  lack  of  material  at  hand  that  I  here 
end  this  series  of  articles,  which  has  stretched  out  far 
beyond  the  not  very  definite  limits  of  my  original  de- 
sign. I  have  passed  by  some  subjects  unnoticed  that 
I  purposed  to  take  in  hand,  but  I  have  also  been  led 
whither  I  did  not  think  of  going  when  I  set  out.  If 
my  readers  have  lost  anything,  they  have  also  gained 
something  in  the  event.  That  it  should  be  so  was 
hardly  to  be  avoided.  To  go  directly  to  a  fixed  point, 
which  is  the  only  object  of  one's  journey,  is  easy  ;  but 
a  tour  of  observation  is  generally  brought  to  an  end 
with  some  proposed  object  left  unattained,  through 
the  failure  of  time  and  means,  and  often  by  the  weari- 
ness of  the  observers.  If  those  who  have  gone  with 
me,  in  some  cases  as  my  confiding  fellow-students,  in 
others  as  my  sharp  and  vigilant  censors,  —  a  sort  of 
linguistic  detective  police,  —  do  not  rejoice  at  the  ter- 
mination of  our  word-tour  for  the  latter  reason,  I  have 
been  more  fortunate,  either  in  my  subjects  or  in  their 
treatment,  than  I  could  have  reasonably  hoped  to  be. 
If  I  have  seemed  to  neglect  the  important  for  the 
trivial,  and  to  ask  my  readers  to  give  time  and  atten- 
tion to  the  consideration  of  minute  distinctions  which 
they  have  thought  might  better  be  occupied  with  the 
discussion  of  great  principles,  or  at  least  with  the 
investigation  of  the  laws  of  speech,  it  should  be  re- 
membered that   linguistic  discussion,  from  its  very 


398  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

nature,  must  be  minute  ;  tliat  the  widest  difference  in 
the  meanings  of  words  and  of  sentences  may  be  made 
by  the  slightest  changes  ;  that  the  wealth  of  language 
is  a  sum  of  trifles ;  that  that  which  is  in  a  great  mea- 
sure determined  by  arbitrary  usage  cannot  be  judged 
upon  general  principles ;  and  that  that  cannot  be 
tried  by  its  conformity  to  law  for  which  no  law  has 
yet  been  established.  This,  true  of  all  languages,  is 
particularly  true  of  English,  which  is  distinguished 
among  the  outcomings  of  Babel  for  its  composite 
character  and  its  unsystematic,  although  not  unsym- 
metrical,  development.  It  is,  I  suspect,  less  a  struc- 
ture and  more  a  spontaneous  growth  than  any  other 
language  that  has  a  known  history  and  a  literature. 
Through  all  languages,  as  through  all  connected  phe- 
nomenons,  there  may  be  traced  certain  continuous  or 
often-repeated  modes  of  general  development,  which 
may  be  loosely  called  laws  ;  and  upon  those  there  have 
been  attempts,  more  or  less  successful,  to  found  a  uni- 
versal grammar  or  system  of  speech  formation.  But 
upon  this  field  of  inquiry  I  have  not  professed  to 
enter ;  having  devoted  myself  to  the  consideration  of 
what  is  peculiar  to  our  mother-tongue,  rather  than  to 
what  she  has  in  common  with  others.  Even  in  this 
respect,  what  I  have  written  is  at  least  as  far  from 
being  complete  as  my  object  in  writing  was  from  com- 
pleteness. 

The  series  has  been  honored  by  an  attention  that 
gratified  and  cheered  me  as  I  wrote.  I  owe  much  to 
my  critics  ;  not  onl}^  to  those  who  have  given  me  a 
favorable  hearing  and  insured  it  for  me  from  others, 
but  to  those  who  have  endeavored  to  sting  me  with 
sneers  and  overwhelm  me  with  ridicule,  partly  from  a 
sense  of  duty  to  their  language  and  their  kind,  and 


CONCLUSION  399 

partly  that  they  might  show  their  readers  that,  with 
all  my  deficiencies,  I  had  the  merit  of  being  the  occa- 
sion of  the  display  of  superior  knowledge,  if  not  of 
superior  courtesy,  in  others.  To  the  latter,  indeed, 
I  stand  more  indebted  than  to  the  former ;  for  it  is 
not  from  our  friends  that  we  learn,  but  from  our 
enemies.  They  show  us  where  we  are  weak.  And, 
besides,  few  of  mine  have  failed,  while  giving  me 
instruction  in  English,  to  furnish  me  with  the  most 
valuable  means  of  improvement  in  the  use  of  lan- 
guage, —  examples  of  false  syntax  for  correction.  Of 
these,  however,  I  have  not  availed  myself  publicly  for 
the  instruction  of  others,  although  I  might  have  cru- 
cified most  of  my  critics  upon  crosses  made  out  of 
their  own  heads.  And,  indeed,  in  my  search  for  ex- 
amples I  have  generally  turned  from  the  writings 
of  my  immediate  contemporaries  and  countrymen  to 
those  of  other  generations  and  other  countries,  or  to 
the  anonymous  pages  of  public  documents  and  news- 
papers. 

Many  letters  have  come  to  me  with  welcome  ques- 
tions, objections,  suggestions,  of  which  I  have  had 
time  and  opportunity  to  notice  very  few,  to  my  regret. 
Among  the  remarks  I  have  made,  none  were  so  fruit- 
ful of  letters  of  information  as  my  mere  passing  allu- 
sion to  the  slang  phrase,  "  a  continental  damn."  The 
number  of  "  The  Galaxy  "  in  which  it  was  made  was 
hardly  published  before  I  received  a  letter  informing 
me  of  the  existence  in  this  country,  at  the  remote 
period  of  seventy  or  eighty  years,  of  a  paper  currency 
called  Continental,  and  that  this  currency  was  worth- 
less, and  that  hence  —  and  so  forth,  and  so  forth. 
This  was  soon  followed  by  others  to  the  same  effect, 
their  numbers  increasing  as  the  time  wore  on.     They 


400  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

came  to  me  from  the  North,  South,  East,  West,  and 
Middle  ;  from  Passamaquoddy  and  the  Gulf ;  from 
Squam  Beach  and  Lower  California.  I  might  almost 
say  or  sing  that  they  were  sent  from  Greenland's  icy 
mountains,  from  India's  coral  strand,  to  tell  me  that 
there  had  been  Continental  money  in  this  land.  They 
came  to  me  at  "  The  Galaxy  "  office,  at  my  own  office, 
at  my  house.  Like  Pharaoh's  frogs  in  number  and  in 
pertinacity,  they  climbed  up  into  my  bed-chamber,  and 
I  have  the  satisfaction  of  knowing  that,  like  the  frogs, 
some  of  them  went  into  my  oven.  I  dreaded  meeting 
my  friends  in  the  street ;  for  I  felt  that  there  was  not 
one  of  them  that  did  not  long  to  lead  me  quietly  aside, 
even  if  he  did  not  do  so,  and  say,  "  About  that  conti- 
nental damn,  I  think  I  can  set  you  right.  After  the 
Revolution  there  was  a  vast  amount  of  paper  money 
circulating  through  the  country.  This  was  called  the 
Continental  currency,  and,  as  it  proved  worthless  "  — • 
and  so  forth,  and  so  forth.  Really,  I  hope  my  friends 
will  not  misapprehend  me  when  I  say  that  it  is  gen- 
erally safe  to  assume  that  the  court  knows  a  little  law. 
I  had  heard,  before  the  coming  of  this  year  of  grace 
1869,  that,  after  the  Revolution,  there  was  a  vast 
amount  of  paper  money  circulating  through  the  coun- 
try ;  that  this  was  called  Continental  currency  ;  that  it 
proved  worthless  —  and  so  forth,  and  so  forth.  Yet 
I  do  not  incline  to  the  opinion  that  hence  comes  our 
"continental  damn."  The  phrase  seems  to  me  a 
counterpart,  if  not  a  mere  modification,  of  others  of 
the  same  sort,  —  a  tinker's  damn,  a  trooper's  damn  ; 
and,  as  the  troops  of  the  colonies  "were  called  Conti- 
nentalers,  or  Continentals,  during  the  war,  and  for 
many  years  afterward,  it  seems  to  me  much  more 
probable  that  the  phrase  in  question  was,  at  first,  » 


CONCLUSION  401 

Continental's  damn,  from  which  the  sign  of  the  pos- 
sessive was  gradually  dropped,  than  that  an  adjective 
was  taken  from  money  and  used  to  qualify  a  curse  ; 
and  still  more  probable  that  the  epithet  was  added 
in  that  mere  disposition  toward  the  use  of  vague, 
big,  senseless  phrase  that  moulds  the  speech  of  such  as 
use  this  one. 

Among  the  propositions  and  requests  that  have  been 
elicited  by  the  articles  embodied  in  this  volume,  is  one 
which  comes  to  me  from  many  quarters,  and  which  one 
correspondent  puts  in  the  following  attractive  form  to 
the  editors  of  "  The  Galaxy  "  :  "  Could  not  he  [i.  e., 
the  present  writer]  be  induced  to  prepare  a  book  for 
schools  which  would  embody  his  ideas,  and  all  that  it 
would  be  necessary  for  scholars  to  learn  in  regard  to 
the  use  and  construction  of  language,  and  so  save 
many  cries  and  tears  that  go  out  over  the  present  un- 
intelligible books  that  pass  for  grammars  ?  I  am  sure 
that  a  future  generation,  if  not  the  present,  would 
rise  up  and  bless  his  name."  This  request  is  made  by 
a  teacher,  as  it  has  been  by  others  of  the  same  honora- 
ble profession.  I  answer,  that  I  would  gladly  act  on 
this  suggestion  if  it  were  probable  that  any  responsi- 
ble  and  competent  publisher  would  make  it  prudent 
for  me  to  do  so.  It  would  be  delightful  to  believe  that 
the  next  generation  would  rise  up  and  call  me  blessed  ; 
but  I  am  of  necessity  much  more  interested  in  the 
question  whether  the  present  generation  would  rise 
up  and  put  its  hand  in  its  pocket  to  pay  me  for  my 
labor.  Any  one  who  is  acquainted  with  the  manner 
in  which  school-books  are  "  introduced  "  in  this  coun- 
try knows  that  the  opinions  of  competent  persons 
upon  the  merits  of  a  book  have  the  least  possible  in- 
fluence upon  its  coming  sufficiently  into  vogue  to  make 


402  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

its  publication  profitable ;  and  publishers,  like  other 
men  of  business,  work  for  money.  One  of  the  trade 
made,  I  know,  —  although  not  to  me,  — an  answer  like 
this  to  a  proposition  to  publish  a  short  series  of  school- 
books  :  "  I  believe  your  books  are  excellent ;  but,  sup- 
posing that  they  are  all  that  you  believe  them  to  be, 
after  stereotyping  them  I  should  be  obliged  to  spend 
one  hundred  thousand  dollars  and  more  in  introdu- 
cing them.  I  am  not  prepared  to  do  this,  and  there- 
fore I  must  say.  No,  at  once.  The  merit  of  a  school- 
book  has  nothing  to  do  with  its  value  in  trade."  And 
the  speaker  was  a  man  of  experience.  Provoked  by 
the  ineptness  of  a  school-book  which  fell  into  my 
hands,  I  went  once  to  an  intelligent  and  able  teacher, 
in  whose  school  I  knew  it  was  used,  and,  calling  his  at- 
tention to  the  radical  faults  in  the  book,  —  faults  of 
design  which  I  knew  there  was  no  need  that  I  should 
point  out  to  him  in  detail,  —  I  asked  him  why  he  used 
for  elementary  instruction  a  book  so  fitted  to  mislead 
his  scholars.  His  answer  was  :  "  All  that  you  say  is 
true.  I  know  that  the  book  is  a  very  poor  one  ;  but 
we  are  ordered  to  use  it.  What  can  I  do?"  Now, 
one  of  the  body  that  gave  this  order  was,  at  that  time, 
a  neighbor  of  mine,  —  a  coarse,  low-minded,  entirely 
uneducated  man,  who  was  growing  rapidly  rich.  He 
was  about  as  fit  to  pronounce  upon  the  merits  of  a 
school-book  as  Caligula's  horse  was  for  the  consul- 
ship. The  publication  of  elementary  school-books 
and  dictionaries  is  one  of  the  most  profitable  branches 
of  the  trade,  if  books  can  be  "  introduced  "  into  gen- 
eral use,  but  otherwise  it  is  not  so ;  and  publishers 
manage  this  part  of  their  business  just  as  railway 
companies  and  other  corporations  do,  —  with  a  single 
eye  to  profit.     A  railway  company,  managed  by  men 


CONCLUSION  403 

>f  respectable  position,  finds  itself  threatened  with  a 
law  restraining  its  privileges,  or  desires  the  passage  of 
a  law  increasing  them.  Its  agents  make  a  calculation 
somewhat  in  this  form :  To  submit  to  the  threatened 
law,  or  to  do  without  the  one  that  is  desired,  will  in- 
volve the  loss  of  so  much  money ;  to  defeat  the  law 
in  one  case,  or  to  obtain  it  in  the  other,  by  spending 
money  to  influence  votes,  will  cost  so  much  less.  The 
latter  course  is  taken,  without  scruple  or  hesitation. 
With  the  company  it  is  a  mere  matter  of  business ; 
the  morals  of  the  question  are  the  concern  of  the 
other  parties  to  the  arrangement.^ 

^  That  these  strictures,  made  in  The  Galaxy  of  May,  1869, 
were  just  and  timely,  is  shown  by  the  following  articles,  which 
subsequently  appeared  in  The  American  Booksellers''  Guide  (Jan- 
uary, 1870),  and  The  Evening  Mail  (March  3,  1870)  :  — 

"A  Protest  addressed  to  Publishers  of  School-books. 

"  In  the  last  number  of  the  Guide  we  reprinted  from  the 
Brooklyn  Eagle  the  list  of  school-books  adopted  by  the  Board  of 
Education  of  that  city,  and  the  prices  at  which  the  books  were 
furnished  by  the  publishers.  These  prices  were  about  one  third 
of  those  at  which  the  books  are  regularly  sold.  They  were  fur- 
nished at  the  reduced  prices  to  influence  the  Board  of  Education 
of  Brooklyn  to  adopt  them  over  other  books  that  were  offered, 
and  thereby  to  secure  their  introduction  into  the  schools. 

"  This  case  is  only  one  example  of  what  is  being  done  all  over 
the  country  by  the  agents  of  the  school-book  houses.  The  prices 
of  the  books  sold  to  Brooklyn,  although  much  less  than  first  cost, 
are  better  than  are  obtained  in  the  majority  of  cases  of  what  is 
called  '  first  introduction.'  Introduction  is  usually  effected  by  ex- 
changing new  books  for  the  old  ones  in  use.  The  house  whose 
books  are  thus  thrown  out  naturally  seeks  the  first  opportunity  in 
any  quarter  to  exchange  its  books  for  those  of  its  rival. 

"  The  introduction  of  school-books  has  become  a  source  of 
bribery  and  corruption,  which  is  paralleled  only  in  tne  municipal 
politics  of  our  largest  city.  Boards  of  Education  are  completely 
demoralized.     Cases  are   known  of   exchanges   of  books   being 


404  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

Now,  were  such  a  grammar  and  such  a  dictionary 
published  as  some  readers  of  these  articles  would  like 

made  in  some  cities  as  often  as  once  a  year.  We  shall  not  refer 
to  the  damaging  effect  of  such  changes  upon  the  progress  of  edu- 
cation. Pupils  are  little  more  than  made  acquainted  with  the 
rudiments  of  a  study  as  presented  in  a  text-book,  and  prepared 
to  follow  out  the  method  of  the  author,  when,  lo  !  another  text- 
book is  put  into  his  hands,  and  he  is  compelled  to  discard  the  old 
and  take  up  a  new  system.  But  a  few  changes  of  this  kind  are 
required  to  muddle  the  clearest  intelligence. 

"  It  is  because  of  its  effect  upon  the  trade  that  we  desire  to 
protest  against  this  system  of  bribery,  and  the  damaging  reduc- 
tion of  prices  all  over  the  country.  In  the  first  place,  it  causes 
a  direct  loss  to  publishers  ;  and,  secondly,  it  ruins  the  business  in 
school-books  of  the  local  booksellers. 

•'  It  is  estimated  that  the  loss  caused  to  publishers  by  this  un- 
scrupulous and  corrupt  competition  annually  amounts  to  over 
five  hundred  thousand  dollars.  Nothing  is  really  gained  by  this 
wasteful  expenditure,  as  the  same  books  would  be  sold  in  about 
the  same  proportion  if  it  was  entirely  discontinued.  What  is 
gained  in  one  place  by  unfair  means  is  lost  in  another  by  the  same 
means.  Whether  publishers  confine  themselves  to  fair  methods 
or  foul,  as  the  same  agencies  are  open  to  all,  the  effects  will  in 
general  be  about  equal.  If  this  vast  sum  were  saved  to  be  em- 
ployed in  legitimate  channels,  better  prices  could  be  paid  to 
authors  and  better  work  obtained,  more  could  be  spent  upon  the 
mechanical  execution  of  books,  they  could  be  offered  lower,  and, 
lastly,  publishers  would  realize  more  money,  and  their  business 
would  rest  upon  a  securer  basis. 

"  But  the  greatest  injury  is  done  to  the  local  booksellers,  who 
sell  the  larger  portion  of  the  books.  By  publishers  offering  their 
books  through  periodical  travelling  agents  at  one  half  the  retail 
prices,  the  trade  of  the  booksellers  is  not  only  taken  out  of  their 
hands  at  particular  times,  but  their  customers  are  dissatisfied  to 
pay  the  regular  retail  prices  at  any  time.  This  has  become  such 
a  source  of  disatisfaction  that  we  almost  wonder  at  retail  book- 
sellers undertaking  to  supply  school-books  at  all.  They  might 
compel  publishers  to  deal  directly  in  all  cases  with  the  schools, 
and  we  doubt  if  the  ruinous  prices  would,  if  this  were  done,  be 
long  continued. 


CONCLUSION  405 

to  have,  and  should  they  be  received  with  favor,  they 
would  at  OQce  provoke  the  hostility  —  cool,  vigilant, 

"  We  advise  some  honorable  combination  among  the  leading 
houses  to  put  an  end  to  this  great  and  growing  evil,  which  is  sub- 
versive not  only  of  educational  progress,  but  of  commercial  in- 
tegrity. Such  a  combination  is  possible,  and  such  penalties 
might  be  assessed  against  offenders,  by  mutual  consent,  as  would 
redeem  the  business  from  its  present  repulsive  aspect."  —  Ameri- 
can Booksellers'  Guide. 

..."  Next  to  the  copyright  reform,  the  one  thing  needed  by 
the  publishing  trade  is  the  abolition  of  the  present  outrageously 
wasteful  system  of  '  introducing '  school-books.  As  our  read- 
ers probably  know,  it  is  the  almost  universal  custom  of  school- 
book  publishers,  for  the  sake  of  getting  their  series  used  and 
ousting  books  of  rival  houses,  to  furnish  the  former  —  at  least 
the  first  lot  —  at  even  below  cost  price,  and  to  take  the  old  books 
in  part  pay,  sending  them  to  the  junk-dealers.  Teachers  are 
induced,  by  the  smooth-tongued  agents  of  these  houses  and  the 
large  commissions  which  they  offer,  to  change  books  so  fre- 
quently that  their  pupils  are  in  a  constant  state  of  perplexity, 
while  the  waste  of  books  is  terrible,  and  all  the  publishers  havo 
their  profits  more  than  half  eaten  up  by  the  necessary  outlays 
and  recriminations.  There  are  two  houses  in  this  country  each 
of  which  loses  probably  between  two  and  three  hundred  thousand 
dollars  a  year  in  this  way,  while  the  total  loss  to  publishers  cannot 
be  mnch  less  than  a  million  dollars.  We  are  glad  to  be  able  to  state 
that  a  movement  is  now  on  foot,  which  bids  fair  to  succeed,  to- 
ward doing  away  with  this  great  evil.  Representatives  of  such 
houses  as  Barnes,  Harper,  Appleton,  Sheldon,  etc.,  of  this  city, 
have  issued  an  invitation  to  twenty-one  firms  in  New  York,  thir- 
teen in  Philadelphia,  ten  in  Boston,  and  sixteen  elsewhere,  to 
send  representatives  to  meet  in  this  city  the  IGth  of  March,  and 
continue  in  session  until  some  arrangement  is  made  looking  to 
more  sensible  and  profitable  relations  between  school-book  pub- 
lishers." —  Evening  Mail, 

The  proposed  meeting  was  held,  and  measures  were  taken 
which  may  possibly  put  an  end  to  this  reproach  to  the  book 
trade  and  to  the  schools,  public  and  private,  throughout  the 
country. 


406  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

business-like  —  of  men  who  have  many  hundreds  of 
thousands  of  dollars  invested  in  books,  —  in  whole 
systems  of  books,  —  planned  upon  radically  different 
princijjles.  Until  some  man  on  horseback  comes  and 
purges  the  commonweal,  it  always  will  be  necessary 
to  fight  these  men  with  their  own  weapons.  And 
even  then  there  is  the  fight  in  newspapers,  by  arti- 
cles, advertisements,  and  opinions  from  eminent  gen- 
tlemen. I  have  been  behind  the  scenes  enough  to 
know  thoroughly  how  all  this  business  is  managed, 
and  I  would  tell  on  very  slight  provocation.  Why, 
even  already  the  priests  of  the  present  idols  have 
begun  to  denounce  a  certain  pestilent  fellow,  and  their 
craftsmen  to  cry,  Great  is  Diana  of  the  Ephesians  ! 

To  publish,  with  any  chance  of  success,  a  book  in^ 
tended  for  use  in  public  schools  has  become  a  serious 
commercial  and  political  undertaking ;  and,  if  nothing 
more  is  expected  for  it  than  its  introduction  into  pri- 
vate schools,  even  then  it  should  be  in  the  hands  of 
publishers  sufficiently  wealthy  and  adroit  to  make  it 
the  interest  of  teachers  to  adopt  the  book  in  their 
schools.  For  if  it  were  left  to  go  upon  its  mere  merits, 
it  would,  if  good,  of  course  meet  with  a  certain  sale 
among  intelligent  and  honorable  teachers ;  but  this 
would  be  too  small  to  cause  it  to  be  regarded  by  any 
enterprising  publisher  as  profitable  investment  of 
money  and  labor.  For  these  reasons  I  fear  that  I 
must  be  content  with  dropping  what  I  have  written 
as  seed  into  the  ground,  hoping  that  it  may  have  life 
enough  to  grow  and  bring  forth  fruit,  although  in 
that  case  others  will  reap  the  harvest.  Sic  vos,  non 
vohis. 


APPENDIX 


HOW  THE  EXCEPTION  PROVES  THE  RULE 

The  few  people  who  care  to  say  only  what  they  mean, 
and  who  therefore  think  ahout  what  they  say  and  what 
others  say  to  them,  must  sometimes  he  puzzled  by  the  reply 
often  made  to  an  objection,  "  Well,  he,  or  that,  is  an  excep- 
tion, and  you  know  the  exception  proves  the  rule."  This 
is  uttered  with  calm  assurance,  as  conclusive  of  the  ques- 
tion at  issue,  and  is  usually  received  in  silence,  —  with  an 
air  of  indifferent  acquiescence  on  the  part  of  the  thought- 
less, but  on  the  part  of  the  more  thoughtful  with  a  meek 
expression  of  bewilderment.  The  former  are  saved  from 
the  trouble  of  further  mental  exertion,  and  they  are  con- 
tent ;  the  latter  feel  that  they  have  been  overcome  by  the 
bringing  up  of  a  logical  canon  which  always  stands  ready 
as  a  reserve,  but  the  truth  of  which,  admitted  as  indisputa- 
ble, they  would  like  very  much  to  be  able  to  dispute.  In 
fact,  this  pretentious  ma;xim  infests  discussion,  and  pervades 
the  every-day  talk  of  men,  women,  and  children.  It  ap- 
pears in  the  writings  of  historians,  of  essayists,  and  of 
polemics,  as  well  as  in  those  of  poets,  novelists,  and  journal- 
ists. A  legislator  will  use  it  to  destroy  the  effect  of  an 
instance  brought  forward  which  is  directly  at  variance 
with  some  general  assertion  tliat  he  has  made.  "  The  case 
so  strongly  insisted  upon  by  the  honorable  gentleman  does 
apparently  show  that  all  women  do  not  desire  the  passage 


408  WORDS  AND   TUEIK  USES 

of  a  law  permitting  them  to  wear  trousers.  I  admit  the 
preference  of  Miss  Pettitoes  for  petticoats.  But,  sir,  her 
case  is  an  exception,  and  we  all  know  that  the  exception 
proves  the  rule."  It  enters  even  into  the  word-skirmish 
of  flirtation.  "  How  dare  you  assert,"  says  Miss  Demure 
to  Tom  CrcBsus,  defiance  on  her  lip  and  witchery  in  her 
eye,  "  that  women  nowadays  are  all  mercenary  !  Don't  you 
know  that  is  an  insult  to  me  ?  "  "  Ah,  but.  Miss  Demure," 
replies  the  weakly-struggling  Croesus,  "  you  're  an  excep- 
tion ;  and  you  know  the  exception  proves  the  rule."  Where- 
upon the  lady  submits  with  charming  grace  to  the  con- 
queror, having  within  her  innocent  breast  the  consoHng 
conviction  that  she  is  playing  her  big  fish  with  a  skill  that  will 
soon  lay  him  gasping  at  her  feet.  There  is  no  turn  which 
this  maxim  is  not  thus  made  to  serve ;  and  this  use  of  it 
has  gone  on  for  a  century  or  more,  and  people  submit  to 
the  imposition  without  a  murmur. 

An  imposition  the  maxim  is,  of  the  most  impudent  kind, 
in  its  ordinary  use  ;  for  a  mere  exception  never  proved  a  rule  ; 
and  that  it  should  do  so  is,  in  the  very  nature  of  things,  and 
according  to  the  laws  of  right  reason,  impossible.  Consider 
a  moment.  How  can  the  fact  that  one  man,  or  one  thing, 
of  a  certain  class,  has  certain  traits  or  relations,  prove  that 
others  of  the  same  class  have  opposite  traits  and  other  rela- 
tions ?  A  says,  "  I,  and  C,  and  D,  and  X,  and  Y,  and  Z  are 
white;  therefore  all  the  other  letters  of  the  alphabet  are 
white."  "  No,  they  are  not,"  B  answers,  "  for  I  am  black." 
"  Oh,  you  are  an  exception,"  A  rejoins,  "  and  the  exception 
l^roves  the  rule."  And  A  and  most  of  his  hearers  thereupon 
regard  the  argument  as  concluded,  at  least  for  the  time 
being.  The  supposed  example  is  an  extreme  one,  but  it 
serves  none  the  less  the  purposes  of  fair  illustration.  For 
of  what  value,  as  evidence,  upon  the  color  of  the  alphabet,  is 
the  fact  that  B  is  black  ?  It  merely  shows  that  one  letter  is 
black,  and  that  any  other  may  be  black,  except  those  which 
we  know  to  be  of  some  other  color.  But  of  the  color  of 
the  remaining  twenty-three  letters  it  tells  us  nothing ;  and 


APPENDIX  409 

so  far  from  supporting  the  assertion  that  because  A,  C,  D, 
X,  Y,  and  Z  are  white,  all  the  other  letters  are  white,  it 
warrants  the  inference  that  some  of  them  may  be  black 
also.  And  yet  day  after  day,  for  a  hundred  and  fifty 
years,^  men  of  fair  intelligence  have  gone  on  thoughtlessly 
citing  this  maxim,  and  yielding  to  its  authority  when  used 
exactly  as  it  is  used  in  the  case  above  supposed. 

For  instance,  the  following  passage  is  from  a  leading  arti- 
cle in  the  ''  New  York  Tribune  :  "  — 

"The  business  of  printing  books  is  now  leaving  the  great 
cities  for  more  economical  and  more  desirable  locations.  The 
exceptions  rather  prove  the  rule  tbau  invalidate  it." 

How  do  the  exceptions  either  prove  or  invalidate  the  rule  ? 
In  what  way  does  the  fact  that  there  are  some  printing 
offices  in  Boston,  New  York,  and  Philadelphia  prove  that 
printers  generally  choose  the  smaller  towns  or  the  country  ? 
Plainly,  one  of  these  facts  has  no  relations  whatever  to  the 
other. 

In  "  Lothair,"  Mr.  Disraeli  makes  Hugo  Bohun  say  that 
he  respects  the  institution  of  marriage,  but  thinks  that 
"  every  woman  should  marry,  but  no  man,"  and  to  the  ob- 
jection that  this  view  would  not  work  practically,  reply,  — 

"^Well,  my  view  is  a  social  problem,  and  social  problems  are 
the  fashion  at  present.  It  would  be  solved  through  the  excep- 
tions, which  prove  the  principle.  In  the  first  place,  there  are 
your  swells,  who  cannot  avoid  the  halter  —  you  are  booked  when 
you  are  born  ;  and  then  there  are  moderate  men,  like  myself, 
who  have  their  weak  moments,"  etc.,  etc. 

Perhaps  Mr.  Bohun  or  Mr.  Disraeli  could  explain  how 
the  fact  that  the  natures  or  the  circumstances  of  some  men 
are  such  that  they  are  likely  to  marry  '•'  proves  the  princi- 
ple" that  men  should  not  marry.  But  to  the  eye  of  unas- 
sisted reason,  it  is  merely  evidence  in  favor  of  the  positive 

1  The  date  of  its  first  appearance  in  literature  or  the  records  of  col- 
loquial speech  I  do  not  profess  to  know ;  but  I  cannot  recollect  an 
instance  of  its  use  earlier  than  the  days  of  the  Queen  Anne  essayists. 


410  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

proposition,  that  whatever  men  should  do,  some  will  marry  : 
it  does  nothing  toward  showing  that  other  men  should,  or 
should  not,  either  marry  or  do  anything  else.  If  the  pro- 
position were  that  only  men  of  certain  natures  and  circum- 
stances should  marry,  and  it  were  found  that  in  general 
only  they  did  marry,  there  would  at  least  be  a  connection 
between  the  facts  and  the  proposition  ;  which,  in  Mr.  Bo- 
hun's  argument,  there  is  not. 

The  London  "  Spectator,"  in  one  of  the  few  discriminat- 
ing judgments  that  have  recently  been  published  of  Dick- 
ens's genius,  thus  supports  the  opinion  that  he  was  unable  to 
express  the  finer  emotions  naturally  :  — 

"  In  the  delineation  of  remorse  he  is,  too,  much  nearer  the 
truth  of  emotiou  than  in  the  delineation  of  grief.  True  grief 
needs  the  most  delicate  hand  to  delineate  [it]  truly.  A  touch 
too  much,  and  you  perceive  an  affectation,  and  therefore  miss 
the  whole  effect  of  bereavement.  But  remorse,  when  it  is  gen- 
uine, is  one  of  the  simplest  of  passions,  and  the  most  difficult  to 
overpaint.  Dickens,  with  his  singular  power  of  lavishing  himself 
on  one  mood,  has  given  some  vivid  pictures  of  this  passion  which 
deserve  to  live.  Still,  this  is  the  exception,  which  proves  the 
rule.  He  can  delineate  remorse  for  murder,  because  there  is  so 
little  real  limit  to  the  feeling,  so  little  danger  of  passing  from 
the  true  to  the  falsetto  tone." 

Now,  in  what  way  does  the  fact  that  Dickens  had  the 
power  of  delineating  one  of  the  simple  passions  prove  that 
he  had  not  the  power  of  delineating  the  more  complex  ? 
Plainly,  it  does  nothing  —  can  do  nothing  of  the  sort,  unless 
by  the  introduction,  as  a  premise,  of  the  postulate  that 
writers  who  can  delineate  simple  passions  cannot  delineate 
the  complex;  which  is  not  true,  and  which  is  not  implied. 
Such  passages  as  this  are  mere  examples  of  the  habit  into 
which  the  most  intelligent  writers  and  critics  have  fallen  of 
regarding  an  exception  not  merely  as  an  exception,  a  phe- 
nomenon which  is  the  consequence  of  exceptional  condi- 
tions, and  there  an  end,  but  as  a  proof  of  the  rule  which 
they  wish  to  establish,  and  which  the  "  exception  '  would 
otherwise  seem  to  invalidate. 


APPENDIX  411 

This  lia^'.it  has  arisen,  it  would  seem,  out  of  a  slight  per- 
version of  a  word.  For,  although  an  exception  does  not 
and  cannot  prove  a  rule,  the  word  exception  being  used  in 
its  ordinary  sense,  the  exception  does  prove  the  rule,  the 
word  being  used  in  its  proper  sense.  The  fallacious  use  of 
the  maxim  is  based  on  the  substitution  of  a  real  substantive, 
that  is,  a  substantive  meaning  a  thing,  for  a  verbal  substan- 
tive, that  is,  a  substantive  meaning  an  act.  The  maxim,  as 
we  have  it,  is  merely  a  misleading  translation  of  the  old  law 
maxim,  l^xceptio  probat  regidam,  which  itself  is,  if  not 
mutilated,  at  least  imperfect.  Now,  Exceptio  probat  regu- 
lam  does  not  mean  that  the  thing  excepted  proves  the  rule, 
but  that  the  excepting  proves  the  rule.  Excejitio  was  trans- 
lated, and  rightly  enough,  exception.  But  what  was  the 
meaning  of  that  word  when  the  translation  was  made  ? 
What  is  its  primitive  meaning  now  ?  It  is  the  act  of  ex- 
cepting or  excluding  from  a  number  designated,  or  from  a 
description.  Exceptio  in  Latin,  exception  in  English,  means 
not  a  person  or  a  thing,  but  an  act ;  and  it  is  this  act  which 
proves  a  rule.  But  we,  having  come  to  use  excejytion  to 
mean  the  person  or  the  thing  excepted,  receive  the  maxim 
as  meaning,  not  that  the  excepting  proves  the  rule,  but  the 
person  or  thing  excepted  ;  and  upon  this  confusion  of  words 
we  graft  a  corresponding  confusion  of  thought.  The  maxim, 
in  its  proper  signification,  is  as  true  as  it  is  untrue  in  the 
sense  in  which  it  is  now  almost  universally  used. 

I  have  said  that,  if  not  mutilated,  it  is  at  least  imper- 
fect. I  am  unable  to  cite  an  instance  of  its  use  in  any 
other  form  than  that  under  which  it  is  now  known  ;  but  it 
exists  in  my  mind,  whether  from  memory  or  from  an  un- 
conscious filling  up  of  its  indicated  outlines,  in  this  form  : 
Exceptio  probat  regnlam,  de  rebus  non  exceptis  ;  i.  e.,  the 
excepting  proves  the  rule  concerning  those  things  which  are 
not  excepted.  The  soundness  of  the  maxim  in  this  form, 
and  the  reason  for  its  soundness,  will  be  apparent  on  a  mo- 
ment's consideration.  Suppose  that,  in  a  book  of  travels, 
we  should  find  this   passage  :  "  Here  I  saw  large  flocks  of 


412  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

birds  in  the  cornfields  cawing  and  tearing  up  the  young 
corn.  In  one  flock,  two  of  these  birds  were  white."  The 
conclusion  warranted  by  this  account  would  be,  that  there 
were  crows,  or  birds  like  crows,  in  the  country  visited  by 
the  writer,  and  that  these  crows  were  generally  black.  The 
writer  would  not  have  said  that  the  birds  were  black,  but 
his  exception  of  two  which  were  white  would  go  to  prove 
that,  "as  a  rule  "  (according  to  our  idiom),  the  birds  were 
black,  or  at  least  not  white.  His  exception  of  the  two 
would  prove  the  rule  as  to  the  others.  Exceptio  probat 
regula^n,  de  rebus  non  exceptis.  Again,  if  we  knew  no- 
thing about  the  elephant,  but  were  to  learn  that  the  King  of 
Siam,  when  he  wished  to  ruin  a  courtier,  distinguished  him 
by  sending  him  a  white  elephant,  —  a  present  which  he 
could  not  refuse,  although  the  provision  for  the  proper 
lodging  of  the  beast  and  attendance  on  him  was  sure  to  eat 
up  a  private  fortune,  —  we  should  be  told  nothing  about 
elephants  in  general ;  yet  we  should  know,  without  further 
information,  that  they  were  dark  colored,  because  of  the 
implied  exception  of  the  white  elephant. 

The  maxim  in  question  is  akin  to  another  recognized  ia 
law  :  Expressio  unius,  excluslo  alterius  ;  i.  e.,  the  expression 
of  one  (mode  or  person)  is  the  exclusion  of  another.  This 
maxim  is  no  legal  fiction  or  refinement,  it  is  dictated 
by  common  sense,  and  is  a  guide  of  action  in  daily  life. 
If  we  see  on  the  posters  of  a  museum  or  a  circus,  "  Ad- 
mission for  children  accompanying  their  parents,  Fifteen 
cents,"  we  know  at  once  that  children  without  their 
parents  are  either  not  admitted  at  all,  or  must  pay  fuU 
price.  Children  themselves  act  intuitively  upon  the  rea- 
soning embodied  in  this  maxim.  If  a  parent  or  a  teacher 
should  go  to  a  room  full  of  children,  and  say,  "  John  may 
come  and  take  a  walk  with  me,"  they  would  know,  without 
the  telling,  that  all  except  John  were  expected  to  remain. 
They  know  this  just  as  well  as  any  lawyer  or  statesman 
knows  that,  when  a  constitution  provides  for  its  own  amend' 
taent  in  one  way,  that  very  provision  was  meant  to  exclude 


APPENDIX  413 

all  other  methods.  The  child  and  the  statesman  both  act  in 
accordance  with  the  maxim,  Expressio  unites,  exclusio  al- 
terius.  Both  this  maxim  and  the  one  which  is  the  subject 
of  the  present  article  are  founded  upon  the  intuitive  per- 
ception common  to  men  of  all  times  and  races,  and  which 
is  developed,  as  we  have  seen,  in  the  very  earliest  exercise 
of  the  reasoning  powers,  that  an  exclusive  affirmation  im- 
plies a  corresponding  negation. 

A  rare  modern  instance  of  another  and  really  logical 
use  of  tlie  maxim,  that  the  exception  proves  the  rule,  is  fur- 
nished by  Boswell  in  one  of  his  trivial  stories  about  Doctor 
Johnson.  It  was  disputed  one  evening,  when  the  Doctor 
was  present,  whether  the  woodcock  were  a  migratory  bird. 
To  the  arguments  in  favor  of  the  theory  of  migration,  some 
one  replied  that  argument  was  of  little  weight  against  the 
fact  that  some  woodcocks  had  been  found  in  a  certain 
county  in  the  depth  of  winter.  Doctor  Johnson  immedi' 
ately  rejoined,  "  That  supports  the  argument.  The  fact 
that  a  few  were  found  shows  that,  if  the  bulk  had  not 
migrated,  many  would  have  been  found.  Excejjtio probat 
regulam." 

Johnson  himself  affords  another  example  of  the  same 
use  of  the  maxim.  In  the  Preface  to  his  edition  of  Shake- 
speare's works,  he  opposes  and  ridicules  those  critics  who 
have  supposed  that  they  discovered  in  Shakespeare  imita- 
tions of  ancient  writers,  and  that  these  were  evidence  of 
great  learning.     He  says,  — 

"  There  are  a  few  passages  which  may  pass  for  iuiitatious, 
but  so  few  that  the  exception  only  couflrms  the  rule.  He  ob- 
tained them  from  accidental  quotation  or  by  oral  communica- 
tion, and,  as  he  used  what  he  had,  would  have  used  more  if  he 
had  obtained  it." 

Yet  another  instructive  example  of  the  use  of  this  maxim 
is  found  in  the  following  passage  from  Cowper's  "  Tirocin- 
ium, or  Review  of  Schools  :  "  — 

"  See  volunteers  in  all  the  vilest  arts, 
Men  well  endowed  with  honorable  parts. 


414  WORDS   AND   THEIR   USES 

Designed  by  Nature  wise,  but  self-made  foois  ; 
All  these,  and  more  like  these,  were  made  at  sehoola. 
And  if  by  chance,  as  sometimes  chance  it  will, 
That,  though  school-bred,  the  boy  is  virtuous  still, 
Such  rare  exceptions,  shining  in  the  dark. 
Prove  rather  than  impeach  the  just  remark, 
As  here  and  there  a  twinkling  star  descried 
Serves  but  to  show  how  black  is  all  beside." 

According  to  the  common  use  of  the  maxim,  the  infer* 
ence  from  this  passage  would  he,  that  a  few  virtuous  school* 
bred  men  prove,  not  what  they  are  evidence  of,  that  virtu- 
ous men  may  be  bred  at  school,  but  that  the  rule  is,  that 
school-breeding  is  dangerous  to  virtue  !  But  they  prove 
that,  if  they  prove  it  at  all,  by  "  shining  in  the  dark  ;  "  that 
is,  the  surrounding  vileness  points  them  out  as  peculiar  and 
solitary  :  it  excepts  them  ;  and  this  excepting  {exceptio)  as 
to  them  proves  the  rule  as  to  the  mass. 

The  common  use  of  this  maxim  is  worthy  only  of  idiots, 
for  it  involves  idiotic  reasoning ;  a  good  example  of  which 
would  be  the  application  of  the  maxim  to  the  following 
criticism  of  two  political  conventions  :  — 

"  We  dare  say,  if  the  truth  were  all  known,  there  would  be 
little  to  choose  between  the  two  conventions  in  point  of  morals  or 
manners.  Doubtless  there  were  high-minded  and  able  gentle- 
men in  both,  but  we  fear  such  were  the  exception,  and  not  the 
rule." 

Now,  if  the  exception  proves  the  rule,  those  exceptions, 
that  is,  those  high-minded  and  able  gentlemen,  would  of 
themselves  be  evidence  that  the  rest  were  not  able  and 
high-minded.  Another  characteristic  example  would  be  the 
following :  —  It  is  declared  that  all  men  are  totally  de- 
praved. But  we  find  that  A  is  not  totally  depraved.  But 
this  only  shows  that  A  is  an  exception,  and  his  not  being  to- 
tally depraved  proves  the  rule  of  total  depravity.  That  such 
an  application  of  the  maxim  should  be  made  day  after  day 
for  generations  among  people  of  moderate  sense  is  striking 
evidence,  on  the  one  hand,  of  the  way  in  which  the  modili- 


APPENDIX  415 

cation  of  meaning  in  a  word  may  cause  a  perversion  of  an 
established  formula  of  thought ;  and,  on  the  other,  of  the 
supineness  with  which  people  will  submit  to  the  authority 
of  a  maxim  which  sounds  wise,  and  has  the  vantage-ground 
of  age,  particularly  if  they  cannot  quite  understand  it,  and 
it  saves  them  the  trouble  of  thinking.  Let  any  man  invent 
such  a  maxim,  and  use  well  good  opportunities  of  asserting 
it,  and  he  may  be  pretty  sure  that  his  work,  if  not  himself, 
v?ill  attain  a  very  considerable  degree  of  what  is  called 
immortality.  The  failure  of  such  a  maxim  to  be  accepted 
as  conclusive  would  be  a  sign  of  the  decline  of  that  pecul- 
iar mode  of  reasoning  which  would  insist  upon  this  failure 
itself  as  an  exception  that  proved  the  rule  to  which  it  did 
not  conform,  and  of  the  reestablishment  of  that  othet 
mode  which  claims  that,  in  general,  the  excepting  prove* 
the  rule  concerning  that  which  is  not  excepted. 


n 

CONTROVERSY 

Perhaps  the  following  letter,  which  was  published  h 
«  The  Round  Table  "  of  February  27,  1869,  and  the  reply 
which  appeared  in  the  next  number  of  the  same  paper, 
ipay  interest,  or  at  least  amuse,  some  of  the  readers  oJ 
this  volume.  I  may  say  here  without  impropriety,  I  hope, 
that  the  articles  on  Words  and  their  Uses  which  appeared 
in  "  The  Gala,xy  "  were,  as  is  customary  with  me,  written 
in  haste,  and  under  the  pressure  of  a  cry  for  copy  from  the 
printing-office.  Although  the  series  extended  through  two 
years,  not  one  of  them  was  begun  before  that  cry  was  heard, 
or  was  ready  one  hour  before  the  last  minute  when  the  arti- 
cle could  be  received  ;  and  the  manuscript  was  sent  off  to 
the  printer  with  the  ink  damp  upon  the  last  page.  It  was 
put  in  type  that  day,  and  the  next  was  stereotyped. 
Throughout   the   whole   series  I  did  not  rewrite   a  single 


416  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

page,  or,  I  believe,  a  single  sentence.  I  generally  saw  a 
proof,  which  I  corrected  at  my  business  office  within  the 
hour  of  its  receipt ;  but  sometimes  I  did  not.  One  of  those 
cases  in  which  I  did  not  see  a  proof  was  made  the  occasion 
of  the  following  communication.  I  do  not  offer  this  con- 
fession as  an  excuse  or  defence  of  any  essential  error.  A 
critic  can  concern  himself  only  with  what  is  produced  ;  he 
cannot  take  into  consideration  the  circumstances  of  its  pro- 
duction, even  if  he  knows  them.  It  would  have  been  well 
if  the  articles  had  been  written  more  deliberately,  and  cor- 
rected more  carefully  :  but  had  I  waited  till  I  could  do  that, 
they  would,  in  all  probability,  not  have  been  written  at  all ; 
which  alternative  is  doubtless  the  one  that  would  have  been 
preferred  by  my  censor.  In  choosing  a  specimen  of  the 
attacks  to  which  these  articles  subjected  me  (from  all  of 
which  I  tried  to  learn  something,  but  to  only  two  or  three 
of  which  I  made  any  reply),  I  have  taken  his,  because  he 
was  very  much  the  ablest  and  most  learned  of  my  critics  :  — 

STAND-POINT,   ETC. 

To  THE  Editor  of  the  Round  Table. 

Sir  :  —  I  noticed  in  your  issue  of  January  9  a  letter  from 
"  J.  B."  upon  the  word  stand-point,  condemning  it  as  an 
exploded  heresy,  and  moralizing  upon  the  "  total  depravity 
of  human  nature  "  which  after  such  an  explosion  could  still 
countenance  the  heresy.  Your  correspondent  informs  the 
world  that  "  Mr.  White  recently  in  the  '  Galaxy,'  and  Mr. 
Gould,  at  greater  length,  in  '  Good  English,'  have  thoroughly 
analyzed  and  exposed  "  "  the  literary  abortion."  Such  lan- 
guage, so  unlike  that  of  a  man  of  scholarship  or  culture,  led 
me  to  think  that  perhajjs  your  correspondent  did  not  know 
very  much  of  etymology  after  all,  and  that  his  pitying  con- 
tempt might  be  nothing  more  than  a  cloak  for  sciolism  or 
ignorance.  So,  being  somewhat  interested  in  the  fate  of 
the  word  stand-point,  I  gave  "  J.  B.'s  "  letter  a  second  read* 
ing,  and  found  my  suspicions  verified.     He  says  :  — 


APPENDIX  417 

"The  two  words  stand  and  point  cannot  be  grammatically 
joined  together  ;  the  first  word  must  be  changed  to  a  participle 
in  order  to  make  them  legally  united.  Stand(»^-point  is  Eng- 
lish." 

From  this  it  is  evident  that  "  J.  B."  thinks  the  former 
half  of  the  word  standing-point  to  be  a  participle ;  so  also 
of  turning-pointy  landing-place,  etc.  What  will  he  say 
when  it  is  suggested  to  him  that  in  each  of  these  compounds 
the  former  element  is  a  substantive,  and  not  a  participle,  and 
that  a  participle  placed  before  a  noun  in  English,  whether 
to  form  a  compound  or  not,  always  qualifies  the  noun,  — 
becomes,  in  fact,  an  adjective  ?  Junqiing-jack,  dancing- 
girl,  are  examples  of  compounds  formed  of  a  qualifying  par- 
ticiple and  a  noun,  for  dancing-girl  means  a  girl  who  dances. 
Sttmibling-blocky  on  the  contrary,  does  not  mean  a  block 
that  stumbles  ;  nor  does  ttirning-p)oint  mean  a  point  that 
turns,  or  landing-place  a  place  that  lands.  The  words  mean 
respectively  a  block  which  causes  stumbling  (stumbling  is 
used  as  a  noun,  1  John,  ii.  10),  a  point  at  which  turning  (or 
a  turn)  takes  place,  a  place  for  landing  (=  disembarkation). 
On  the  same  analogy  is  formed  the  word  standing-point, 
which  means,  not  a  point  which  stands,  but  a  point  where  one 
takes  his  stand,  standing  being  a  noun,  and  not  a  participle. 
But  stand,  as  the  phrase  "  takes  his  stand "  shows,  is  as 
good  a  noun  as  standing,  and  has  the  additional  advantage 
of  not  being  ambiguous,  as  the  latter  is.  "  J.  B.,"  how- 
ever, evidently  thinks  that,  in  the  word  stand-point,  stand 
must  necessarily  be  part  of  a  verb,  inasmuch  as  he  talks 
about  turning  it  into  a  participle.  Now  he  must  know,  for 
he  has  read  Mr.  White's  remarks  in  the  "  Galaxy,"  that 
stand-point  is  an  Anglicized  form  of  the  German  Stand- 
punkt.  If  he  were  acquainted  with  German,  he  would 
know  that  in  that  word  the  former  element,  Stand,  is  a 
noun  ;  were  it  a  verb,  the  word  would  be  Stelipmnkt,  on  the 
analogy  of  Drehbank,  Wohnzimmer,  and  so  forth.  This 
being  so,  why,  if  we  may  ?>2Ly  play-ground,  bath-room,  death- 
iedy  may  we  not  say  stand-point  ?     Even  supposing  the 


418  WORDS   AND   THEIR  USES 

former  half  were  a  verb,  why  miglit  we  not  admit  the  com< 
pound  on  the  analogy  of  go-cart,  ivash-tuh,  thresh-old,  dye- 
house  ?  So  much  for  the  form  of  the  woi'd.  But  "  J.  B." 
proceeds  :  — 

"  Standing-point  is  English  ;  but  the  difficulty  with  that  is 
that  nobody  can  be  fooled  into  belicYing  that  it  means  '  point  of 
view.'  Hence  it  cannot  replace  stand-point,  which  people  fool 
themselves  into  believing  does  mean  '  point  of  view.' " 

Now,  it  is  well  to  remark  that  point  of  view  is  not  an  indi- 
genous English  expression  any  more  than  stand-point  is. 
It  is  simply  a  verbal  translation  of  the  French  point  de  vue, 
and  cannot  plead  analogy  in  justification  of  its  adoption  to 
the  same  extent  as  stand-point  can.  View-point  or  viewing- 
point  would  be  more  correct.  I  am  aware  that  we  can  say 
point  of  attack  ;  but  that,  also,  is  a  translation  of  the  French 
point  d'attaque.  So  far,  then,  as  the  origin  and  form  of 
the  expressions  stand-point  and  point  of  view  are  concerned, 
stand-point  has  a  decided  advantage.  It  is  also  the  more 
convenient  expression,  and  the  only  thing,  therefore,  that  re- 
mains to  be  decided  with  regard  to  it  is,  whether  it  gives 
any  intelligible  signification.  When  I  say,  "  Viewed  from 
a  scientific  stand-point,  it  is  false  "  ( Vom  tmssenscliaftli- 
chen  Standpiinkt  angesehen,  ist  esfalsch),  what  do  I  mean  ? 
Simply,  "  Viewed  from  the  position  occupied  by  science,  it 
is  false."  Here  stand-point  has  not  the  meaning  of  point 
of  view  /  and,  indeed,  I  doubt  whether  it  ever  has  precisely. 
There  is  no  other  word  in  the  English  language  that  will 
exactly  express  the  meaning  of  stand-point,  as  any  one 
may  convince  himself  by  trying  to  express  otherwise  the 
phrase,  "  The  stand-point  of  philosophy  is  different  from 
that  of  science."  "  The  philosophical  point  of  view  is 
different  from  the  scientific  "  has  quite  a  different  significa- 
tion. 

After  convincing  myself  of  the  inaccuracy  of  "  J.  B.'s  " 
remarks  on  the  word  stand-point,  I  thought  I  should  like 
to  know  what  Mr.  White  had  to  say  about  it.    Accordingly, 


APPENDIX  419 

I  procured  a  copy  of  the  number  of  the  Galaxy  containing 
the  article  in  which  his  remarks  on  the  word  occur.  These 
I  found  very  temperate,  and  I  regretted  that  I  coukl  not 
agree  with  him.  But  when  I  came  to  read  the  rest  of  his 
article,  I  found  so  many  indications  of  want  of  profound 
knowledge  and  scholar-like  accuracy,  that  I  bade  my  regrets 
farewell.  To  give  an  instance  or  two.  In  speaking  of  the 
word  telegram,  which  he  does  not  seem  to  know  is  altogether 
an  incorrect  formation,  he  says  :  — 

"  If  engrave  (from  en  and  graphd)  gives  us  rightly  engraver  and 
engraving,  photograph  or  photograve  should  gives  us  photographer 
and  photographing,  and  telegraph,  telegrapher,  and  telegraphing." 

This  would  be  true  if  engrave  did  come  from  eV  and 
ypi<pw ;  but  it  does  not,  and  only  a  person  profoundly  igno- 
rant of  English  etymology  could  have  supposed  that  it  did. 
In  the  first  place,  the  existence  of  the  verb  grave  as  a  verb 
(see  Chaucer,  "  Troilus  and  Creseide,"  Book  II.,  Proeme, 
line  47,  "  Eke  some  men  grave  in  tre,  som  in  stone  wall." 
Ibid,  Book  III.,  line  1468,  etc.)  and  the  form  of  the  parti- 
ciple engraven  might  have  sufficed  to  convince  Mr.  "White 
that  the  word  engrave  was  of  Saxon  origin.  A  very  com- 
mon verb  in  Anglo-Saxon  is  grafan  (conj.  grafe,  grof, 
graferi),  e.  g.,  Psalm  Ixxvii.  58  [English  version  Ixxviii. 
58]:- 

"  Sva  hilis  yere  oft  aveahtan, 
ponne  hi  of erhydig  up-ah6fan 
and  him  vohgodu  vorhtan  and  grofan." 

The  forms  graue  and  igratien  occur  in  Layamon,  graue, 
grauea,  grauen  (and  graued)  in  Middle-English,  and  grave, 
graved,  graven  (and  graved)  in  Modern  English.  It  is 
only  in  comparatively  recent  times  that  the  compound  en- 
grave has  replaced  the  simple  verb.  It  is  no  doubt  true 
that  grave  is  from  the  same  root  as  ypdtpo),  but  that  is  quite 
a  different  thing  from  saying  that  it  is  derived  from  yp'i<pw. 
It  is  the  same  as  the  Moeso-Gothic  graban  (see  Ulfilas,  Luke 
vi.  48.     Galeiks   ist  mann  timrjandin  razn.  saei  groh  jah 


420  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

gadiupida,  etc.),  Old  Saxon  higrahan,  Old  Frankish  greva 
(whence  modern  French  graver),  Swedish  grafoa,  graf, 
Danish  grave,  German  graban,  Spanish  grabar.  I  hope  this 
is  sufficient  to  show  that  the  word  engrave  is  not  of  Greek 
origin.  But,  apart  from  these  considerations,  Mr.  White 
ought  to  have  known  at  what  period  Greek  words  began  to 
be  transferred  directly  into  English.  In  the  year  1500 
there  were  probably  but  four  men  in  all  England  who  knew 
anything  of  Greek. 

Under  the  head  of  Enquire,  Enclose,  Endorse,  Mr. 
White  says  :  — 

"  A  much-respected  correspondent  urges  the  condemnation  of 
these  words,  and  the  advocacy  of  their  disuse,  because  they  are 
respectively  from  the  Latin  inquiro^  includo,  and  in  dorsum,  and 
should,  therefore,  be  written  inquire,  inclose,  indorse.  He  is  in 
error.  They  are,  to  be  sure,  of  Latin  origin,  but  remotely  ; 
they  came  to  us  directly  from  the  French  enquirer,  encloser,  and 
endorser." 

There  is,  no  doubt,  a  verb  endosser,  but  who  ever  heard 
of  such  monstrosities  as  enquirer  and  encloser  ?  Only  writ- 
ers who,  in  their  ignorance  of  French  and  of  the  primary 
principles  of  etymology,  coin  them  out  of  their  own  brain. 
The  French  verbs  corresponding  to  enquire  and  enclose  are 
enquerir  and  enclore.  These  are  written  with  various  or- 
thographies, it  is  true,  but  never  as  Mr.  White  writes  them. 
His  remark  notwithstanding,  Chaucer  and  his  contempo- 
raries wrote  enquest,  enquere,  seldom  enquyre. 

Mr.  White  very  modestly  confesses  :  — 

"  My  having  in  Sanskrit,  like  Orlando's  beard,  is  a  younger 
brother's  revenue  —  what  I  can  glean  from  the  well-worked 
fields  of  my  elders  and  betters." 

That  he  might  have  said  as  much,  or  even  more,  of  his 
English  and  French,  judging  them  by  the  particular  article 
under  consideration,  I  think  I  have  shown  abundantly.  I 
am  almost  tempted  to  leave  his  Latin  unimpeached,  to  spare 
him  "  the  most  unkindest  cut  of  all ;  "  but  I  cannot.    II  a 


APPENDIX  421 

perdu  son  latin.     Under  the  head  of  the  word  Reliable,  ha 
says : — 

"  This  view  of  laughable  seems  to  be  supported  by  the  fact 
that  the  counterpart  of  that  adjective,  risible,  is  not  formed  from 
the  verb  rideo  —  to  laugh  (although,  of  course,  derived  from 
it)  ;  but  from  the  nouu  risum  —  a  laugh,  or  laughter." 

I  should  like  to  ask  Mr.  White,  first,  whether  he  knows 
that  rideo  means  /  laugh  at  as  well  as  /  lauyh  ;  second, 
whethei'  he  does  not  know  that  adjectives  in  hilis  are  some- 
times formed  from  the  stem  of  the  supine  as  well  as  fi'om 
that  of  the  present  of  verbs  ;  third,  in  what  Latin  author  he 
ever  found  the  noun  risum,  meaning  a  laugh  or  laughter  ; 
fourth,  what  risibilis  means  in  Latin. 

It  would  be  easy  to  show  ignorance  of  languages  on  the 
part  of  public  instructors  by  many  more  examples,  but  I 
think  the  above  will  suffice  to  make  evident  the  fact  that 
their  knowledge  is  often  of  the  flimsiest  kind.  There  are, 
unfortunately,  in  this  country  a  large  number  of  persons 
who  get  a  reputation  for  learning  simply  because  they 
have  the  presumption  to  write  on  learned  subjects ;  their 
statements  pass  among  the  multitude  unchallenged,  because 
the  country  lacks  a  learned  class,  which,  by  its  very  pre- 
sence, might  deter  sciolists  from  disgracing  themselves  by 
exhibitions  of  ignorance  and  presumption.  I  wait  and  hope 
for  better  things. 

Yours  very  faithfully,  ©  A 

January  30,  1869. 

MR.   GRANT  WHITE   CONFESSES 

To  THE  Editor  of  the  Round  Table. 

Sib, — The  "Round  Table"  of  February  27,  which  reached 
me  only  this  morning,  contains  a  communication,  the  pur- 
pose of  which  is,  first,  to  maintain  that  stand-point  is  a  nice 
English  compound,  and,  last  (this  being  the  gist  of  the  mat- 
ter), to  make  the  little  argument  on  stand-point  the  start- 
point  of  a  tilt  against  me,  overthrowing  entirely  my  credit 


422  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

for  knowledge  of  Latin,  French,  English,  and  other  things 
in  general,  and  ending  in  a  denunciation  of  "  the  public  in- 
structors "  and  "  the  multitude  "  of  "  this  country  ;  "  wliich 
goal,  when  confortably  reached,  is  my  assailant's  sit-point. 

That  your  readers  may  know  whom  I  mean,  I  will  say 
that  the  article  to  which  I  refer  is  signed  with  the  strange 
characters  "  0  A,"  which,  as  nearly  as  I  am  able  to  dis  ■ 
cover,  are  two  Greek  letters,  named  theta  and  delta. 
Even  to  a  person  less  ignorant  than  I  am,  these  characters 
would  only  conceal  the  identity  of  an  assailant  who  calls 
me  out  by  my  own  name.  But  perhaps  he  hid  his  full  ter- 
rors in  kindness  to  me,  or  it  did  not  suit  his  own  purpose 
to  let  me  know  who  it  is  that  is  hunting  me  for  the  amuse- 
ment of  the  public  ;  for  in  the  latter  case  I  might  have 
seen  that  I  was  what  the  more  learned  boys  at  my  school 
called  a  "yov  kw,"  and  have  come  down  at  once,  thus 
spoiling  sport. 

As  to  stand-point,  I  shall  have  no  dispute  with  him.  I 
shall  merely  ask  to  be  allowed  to  say  "  from  a  scientific 
point  of  view,"  instead  of  "  viewed  from  a  scientific  stand- 
point," and  "  the  position  of  philosophy,"  instead  of  "  the 
stand-point  of  philosophy."  But  I  hope  that  it  will  not 
be  looked  upon  by  "0  A  "  as  an  instance  of  my  presump- 
tion, that  I  protest  against  his  telling  "J.  B."  that  he 
"must  know, /or  he  has  read  Mr.  White's  remarks  in  the 
'  Galaxy,"  that  stand-point  is  an  Anglicized  form  of  the 
German  Standpunkt."  That  I  said  no  such  thing  as  to 
the  origin  of  the  compound  in  question,  will  be  seen  by 
this  repetition  from  the  "  Galaxy  "  of  what  I  did  say  :  — ■ 

"  Stand-point.  —  To  say  the  best  of  it,  this  is  a  poor  com- 
pound. It  receives  some  support,  but  not  full  justification,  from 
the  German  Siandpunkt." 

"  0  A  "  may  think  that,  because  two  similar  word-com- 
binations or  phrases  exist  in  two  languages,  one  must  be 
formed  by  a  mere  phonetic  change  (in  this  case  an  An- 
glicization)   of  the   other.     Such    is    not  my  view  of  the 


APPENDIX  423 

formation  of  language.  If  your  correspondent  will  con- 
sult some  elementary  philological  work,  he  will  learn  that 
like  forms  of  expression  are  found  in  languages  which  are 
not  only  without  kindred,  but  without  contact ;  and  that 
such  forms,  being  developed  according  to  mental  laws  com- 
mon to  the  race,  are  said  to  support  each  other. 

Your  correspondent  again  misrepresents  me  by  saying 
that  I  do  not  seem  to  know  "that  telegram  is  altogether 
an  incorrect  formation."     Here  is  what  I  did  say  :  — 

"  Telegram.  —  This  word,  claimed  as  an  '  American  '  inven- 
tion, has  taken  root  quickly,  and  is  probably  well  fixed  in  the 
language.  It  is  convenient,  and  is  correctly  enough  formed  to 
pass  muster." 

I  have  mistaken  the  force  of  my  language  if  it  did 
not  convey  to  my  readers,  every  one  of  them,  that  in  my 
judgment  telegram  is  an  incorrectly  formed  word,  but 
that  the  irregularity  is  of  a  kind  not  worth  making  a  point 
about. 

"0  A "  says,  in  relation  to  my  remarks  on  the  etymo- 
logy of  enquire,  enclose,  and  endorse :  — 

"  There  is,  no  doubt,  a  verb  endosser,  but  who  ever  heard  of 
such  monstrosities  as  enquirer  and  encloser  ?  Only  writers  who, 
in  their  ignorance  of  French  and  of  the  primary  principles  of 
etymology,  coin  them  out  of  their  own  brain." 

Certainly  I  neither  heard  nor  coined  them.  The  mere 
turning  to  "  Webster's  Unabridged  "  would  have  saved  me 
from  such  a  blunder.  "  0  A's  "  letter  seems  like  the  fruit 
of  a  frequent  consultation  of  that  work,  the  learning  of 
which  may  be  had  by  any  one  in  a  few  minutes  for  a  few 
dollars,  even  in  a  copy,  like  mine,  of  the  old  edition.  To 
say  nothing  of  knowledge,  I  must  have  been  very  lazy,  or 
very  imprudent,  not  to  turn  to  that  cheap  "  cram,"  if  I  did 
nothing  more.     I  wrote  enquerir,  enclore,  and  endosserA 

1  The  mode  and  spirit  of  this  critic's  attacks  —  I  will  not  say  their 
purpose,  for  I  sincerely  believe  that  he  did  not  mean  to  be  dishonest 
—  may  be  inferred  from  the  fact  that  he  again  held  r.ie  up  as  a  preten- 


424  WORDS  AND  THEIR  USES 

Having  ruthlessly  shown  that  I  know  nothing  of  Eng- 
lish, or  French,  or  "  the  primary  principles  of  etymology," 
he  is  "almost  tempted"  to  let  me  off  without  further  ex- 
posure. But  an  opinion  I  hazarded  upon  the  formation  of 
laughable  is  too  much  for  his  self-denial,  and  he  says  of  me, 
'■' II  a  perdu  son  lati7i."  I  cannot  be  sufficiently  grateful 
for  the  tenderness  and  the  delicacy  that  led  him  to  couch 
in  a  language  unknown  to  me  the  terrors  of  the  sentence  it 
became  his  duty  to  pronounce.  But  the  designs  of  benevo- 
lence are  sometimes  defeated,  and  the  mysteries  of  learn- 
ing are  not  always  impenetrable.  I  have  discovered  —  in 
what  way  is  my  own  secret  —  that  the  meaning  of  this 
awful  denunciation  is,  that  I  have  lost  my  Latin.i  But 
even  here  is  hidden  balm  ;  even  here,  benign  concession. 
What  I  have  lost  I  must  once  have  had.  I  confess  that  I 
have  lost  something,  perhaps  without  compensating  gain, 
since  a  body  of  learned  men  sent  me  out  from  them  with 
a  certificate  that  I  was  an  ingenuous  youth,  of  faultless 
morals,   imbued  with   humane  letters.     (If  they  had  but 

tioiis  ignoramus  because  in  the  passage  quoted  from  "Gil  Bias" 
(p.  o2I  of  this  volume)  sans,  temoigna,  qu\  etait,  and  contente  were 
printed  in  The  Galaxy  dans,  temoigna,  q',  etait,  and  content.  It 
■would  seem  that  a  minute's  reflection  would  have  shown  him  that,  as 
I  must  have  written  out  the  passage  from  the  original,  I  had  only  to 
copy  the  letters  that  were  before  me,  and  be  surely  correct,  even  if  I 
were  as  ignorant  of  French  as  I  am  of  the  language  of  the  Man  in  the 
Moon. 

^  My  judge  does  not  quote  the  words  in  which  he  condemns  me, 
perhaps  becaixse  he  assumed  that  aU  his  readers  would  know  their 
origin.  Of  this,  perhaps,  I  alone  among  them  am  ignorant.  The  ear- 
liest use  of  the  phrase  that  I  remember  is  in  the  following  passage  of 
the  liecueil  General  des  Caquets  de  V Accouchee,  1625. 

"  Que  voulez  vous  ma  Commere,  dit  une  Rousse  du  mesme  cartier, 
ainsi  va  la  fortune,  I'un  nionte,  I'autre  descend :  pour  moy  ie  ne  I'ay 
iamais  esprouv^  favorable  h  mes  desirs,  i'ay  dix  enfans  en  nostre  logis, 
dont  le  plus  grand  n'a  que  xij  ans,  il  me  met  hors  du  sens,  i'avois  fait 
venir  un  Pedan  de  I'Universit^  pour  le  tenir  en  bride  :  mais  il  y  a  perdu 
son  latin,  il[s]  seront  en  fin  contraints  d'aller  demander  I'aumosne  si 
le  temps  dure."  —  La  Seconde  Journee,  p.  62. 


APPENDIX  425 

known  what  they  were  doing !  )  But  nevertheless  I  shall 
endeavor  to  answer  these  abstruse  questions  :  — 

"  I  should  like  to  ask  Mr.  White,  first,  whether  he  knows  that 
rideo  means  I  laugh  at  as  well  as  I  laugh  ;  second,  whether  ho 
does  not  know  that  adjectives  in  bilis  are  sometimes  formed 
from  the  stem  of  the  supine  as  well  as  from  that  of  the  present 
of  verbs  ;  third,  in  what  Latin  author  he  ever  found  the  noun 
risum,  meaning  a  laugh  or  laughter  ;  fourth,  what  risibilis  means 
in  Latin." 

I  do,  or  did,  know  that  the  secondary  meaning  of  rideo 
is  to  laugh  at,  to  deride.  I  do,  or  did,  know  that  adjec- 
tives in  bilis  are  not  only  sometimes,  but  often,  formed 
upon  the  stem  of  the  supine  ;  but  also  that  they  are  some- 
times made  from  nouns.  Risibilis  (which  I  have  heard  it 
whispered  is  not  the  best  Latin)  is,  of  course,  the  counter- 
part of  risible,  or  was  when  I  went  to  school ;  and  as  to 
risum,  at  that  time  I  met  with  the  following  line  in  a  Latin 
author  —  Horace  —  who  was  held  up  to  me  as  a  poet  of 
some  repute  :  — 

"  Spectatum  admissi  risum  teneatis  amici  ?  " 

and  this  risum  I  translated,  without  reproach,  "laugh- 
ter ;  "  parsing  it  as  the  accusative  case  or  objective  form 
of  risus.  Horace  asked  the  question  in  regard  to  the 
picture  of  "  a  meermaiden  vot  had  n't  god  nodings  on," 
which  some  Roman  Barnum  seems  to  have  exhibited  in 
the  Forum  ;  but  it  has  since  been  applied  to  other  specta- 
cles, as  "0  A  "  may  find  on  the  publication  of  the  next 
"  Round  Table." 

It  is  upon  engrave,  however,  and  my  passing  assump- 
tion that  its  origin  is  en  and  r/rajjho,  that  your  correspon- 
dent lays  himself  most  largely  out,  here  seeming  to  put  all 
that  he  knows  into  one  article,  —  something  I  never  do  if 
I  can  help  it.  To  prove,  what  I  cast  no  doubt  upon,  that 
the  word  grave  is  to  be  found  in  Teutonic  tongues  at  a 
period  before  the  revival  of  learning,  he  musters  the  Anglo- 
Saxon,  the  Old  Saxon,  the  Frankish,  Swedish,  Danish,  and 


426  WORDS   AND  THEIR  USES 

German  forms  of  the  word.  Here,  indeed,  is  an  immense 
display  of  erudition  ;  which,  alas !  is  something  quite  be- 
yond me,  as,  again,  all  this  is  in  that  blessed  and  wonderful 
book,  "  Webster's  Unabridged,"  which  is  a  very  present 
help  in  time  of  trouble  to  gentlemen  who  wish  to  appear 
learned  in  etymology,  —  a  book  which  I  confess,  with  tears, 
that  I  have  shamefully  neglected,  and  with  a  painful  sense 
of  wasted  opportunities,  when  I  see  the  prodigious  erudi- 
tion that  its  perusal  has  developed  in  the  other  boy.  I  am 
also  told  that  Chaucer  uses  grave  in  such  phrases  as  "  some 
men  grave  in  tre,"  which,  to  a  man  who,  having  read 
Chaucer  for  pleasure  from  his  boyhood,  has  within  the  last 
six  months  re-read  every  word  of  him  and  of  Gower  care- 
fully and  critically,  is  valuable,  nay,  invaluable  informa- 
tion. 

My  executioner  also  piously  finds  a  grave  for  me  in 
sacred  ground,  —  Ulfilas's  Moeso-Gothic  translation  of  the 
Gospels,  —  a  very  interesting  and  philologically  instructive 
remnant  of  early  Christian  scholarship,  the  many  lacunae  in 
which  are  much  to  be  deplored.  But  the  example  cited  by 
"  0  A,"  "  saei  groh  jab  gadiupida,"  is  not  the  happiest  he 
might  have  chosen,  as  it  presents  only  the  strong  preterite 
of  the  Mceso-Gothic  verb,  with  a  change  of  the  vowel.  The 
following  seems  more  to  the  purpose :  "  graban  ni  mag, 
bidyan  skama  mik  "  (Luke  xvi.  3)  ;  i.  e.,  I  may  not  dig,  to 
beg  shames  me.  For  grave  seems  always  to  have  meant, 
to  dig,  to  make  a  hole,  to  scratch.  Very  long  before  the 
time  of  Ulfilas  and  his  Moeso-Goths,  Homer  used  it  in  the 
Iliad.     First  thus  :  — 

"  rpdrpas  iv  TtlvaKi  ttti/kt^  OvfjLOcpBopa  iroWd."  —  Z.,  1.  169. 

Here  ypdif/a's  iv  irivaKi  means,  writing  upon  a  tablet ;  but,  in 
the  next  passage  in  which  grave  occurs,  it  means,  to  scratch 
deep,  to  wound  :  — 

"  BX^To  yap  S>fj.ov  Sovpl,  irp6a<o  TfTpafififvos  otef, 

"AKpov  iiri\iyh7)V  ypd\pev  5e  oi  ocTTfov  &XP'^ 
,  A'xM'V  Uov\v5dfj.ayTOs.''  — P.,  1.  599. 


APPENDIX  427 

Here  ypdij/ev  Si  ol  ocTTeov  d;(pts  means,  pierced  to  the 
bone.  Thus,  even  in  Greek,  to  write,  i.  e.,  scratch  in  wax, 
seems  to  be  only  the  secondary  meaning  of  grave,  wliioh  lias 
not  changed  its  signification  or  its  form  for  three  thousand 
years,  and  which,  in  my  ignorance,  I  think,  went,  with  other 
words  and  some  letters,  westward  and  northward  through 
Dacia  into  Western  Europe. 

My  Greek  initialed  censor  says  I  "  ought  to  have  known 
at  what  time  Greek  words  began  to  be  transferred  directly 
into  English."  I  confess  I  ought,  for  I  learned  it  long  ago; 
and  he  tells  me  that  in  the  year  1500  there  were  probably  but 
four  men  in  England  who  knew  anything  of  Greek.  In 
very  deed  I  had  heard  something  of  this  kind  before ;  and 
I  connected  with  it  the  fact  that  the  word  engrave  does  not 
appear  in  English  before  that  time.  The  old  English- 
formed  participle  graven  I  know,  but  the  English-formed 
participle  engraven  I  do  not  know  in  literature  three  hun- 
dred and  fifty  years  old.  I  am  inclined  to  the  opinion,  not 
only  that  grave  is  a  direct  descendant,  as  it  is  a  perfect 
counterpart,  of  ypdffxD,  but  that  the  aj)pearance  of  engrave 
in  English  is  a  consequence  of  an  acquaintance  with  the 
Greek  compound  eyypa</)oj ;  just  as  (to  cite  an  extreme  case 
in  illustration),  although  we  find  asperge  in  French,  spar- 
gen  in  Old-German,  and  sperage  in  English  before  the 
year  1500,  asparagus,  not  known  in  English  before  that 
date,  is  a  direct  descendant  and  counterpart  of  the  Greek 
dcTTrapayo?. 

The  editor  of  the  "  Round  Table,"  with  courteous  jus- 
tice, offers  me  the  opportunity  of  defending  myself.  Far 
be  it  from  me  to  do  so.  Rather,  lest  I  should  be  justly 
placed,  to  use  the  words  of  my  accuser,  among  "  that  large 
number  of  persons  "  who,  "  in  this  country,"  get  a  "  reputa- 
tion for  learning  merely  because  they  have  the  presumption 
to  write  on  learned  subjects,"  let  me  at  once  confess  m)'^  utter 
ignorance  of  the  subject  on  which  I  have  been  writing.  Yet 
it  was  not  until  I  read  the  "  Round  Table  "  this  morning 
that  I  fully  appreciated  the  flagrancy,  the  brazenness,  of  my 


428  WORDS  AND   THEIR   USES 

imposture.  Nevertheless,  may  it  not  be  accepted  as  a  plea 
in  misericordiam  that  I  make  no  pretension  to  the  "  pro- 
found learning  "  of  my  accuser,  but  only  to  some  knowledge, 
yet  very  imperfect,  of  the  English  language  ? 

I  have,  however,  managed  to  discover,  as  I  think,  by  the 
aid  of  a  gentleman  who  hath  the  tongues,  and  whose  ser- 
vices I  have  secured,  at  an  enormous  expense,  for  this  occa- 
sion only,  what  the  Greek  characters  of  your  correspond- 
ent's signature  "0  A  "  stand  for.  They  are  probably,  I 
am  told,  the  initial  letters  of  ©apcro?  Avcr/coAov,  meaning 
fastidious  confidence,  or,  in  the  simple  English,  more  be- 
coming to  one  like  me,  and  more  to  my  taste,  peevish  bold- 
ness. 

Your  correspondent  has  now  the  field  to  himself.  Hav- 
ing confessed  all  that  he  has  accused  me  of,  I  assure  him 
that  it  shall  be  his  fault  if  I  trouble  him  hereafter. 

I  am,  sir,  your  obedient  servant, 

KicHARD  Grant  White. 

Bat  Ridge,  The  Narrows,  L.  I.,  March  1,  1869. 


INDEX 


INDEX 


A,  broad  ah  sound  of,  50. 

abortive,  78. 

accommodated,  24. 

accouchemeut,  100. 

accountable,  209. 

adjectives,  185. 

adjectives  in  en,  239. 

a-doing,  320. 

adopt,  73. 

adverbs  with  "  to  look,"  393. 

affable,  74. 

aftermath,  361. 

after-thought,  361. 

againbite  of  inwit,  11. 

aggravate,  75. 

agree,  354. 

agreeable,  354. 

agriculturalist,  197. 

ah-am,  223. 

airs,  155. 

ale-house,  138. 

Alford,  Dean,  33. 

alike,  77. 

allow,  78. 

allude,  77. 

a-making,  320. 

amenities,  23. 

American  English,  xviii.,  33. 

American  style,  36. 

anchorable,  207. 

and  so  forth,  191. 

animal,  79. 

answerable,  209. 

antecedent,  79. 

appear,  354. 

apple,  352. 

apple-butter,  352. 

apple-john,  352. 

apple-slump,  352. 

approve,  354. 

apt,  79,  84. 

Aristotle,  331. 

arm,  354. 


armory,  118. 

article,  128. 

artist,  80. 

as,  121. 

Ascham's  "  Schoolmaster,"  320. 

as  well,  167. 

ate,  127. 

authoress,  187. 

auxiliary  verbs,  288. 

available,  208. 

awful,  145,  167. 

axed,  7. 

Bad,  223. 

bade,  106. 

Bailey's  Dictionary,  340. 

bakery,  117. 

balance,  81. 

banquet,  .352. 

banquet-halls,  352. 

banqueting-room,  352. 

banting,  184. 

bar-room,  138. 

Barrow,  Isaac,  320. 

basin,  70. 

battery,  117. 

battlemented,  99. 

be,  223,  329. 

bear,  100. 

become,  110. 

beggary,  117. 

begun,  104,  105,  377. 

being  built,  315,  394,  395. 

being  done,  xvi. 

belfry,  117. 

ben,  7. 

B^ranger,  19. 

beseeched,  108. 

betide,  21 6. 

bidden,  106. 

big  words  for  small  thoughts,  18. 

bird,  211. 

bishop,  342. 


432  INDEX 


blacksmith,  361. 
blasphemy,  91. 
blew,  107. 
Bolingbroke,  318. 
both,  76,  241,  374. 
bountiful,  82. 
bowl,  70. 
brazen,  2.39,  241. 
breakfast,  3G0. 
breakfast-room,  352. 
breakfast-time,  352. 
bren,  212. 
brew-house,  213. 
brid,  212. 
bring,  82. 

Briticisms,  Some,  166. 
British  English,  xviii.,  33. 
broad  ah  sound  of  a,  50. 
Bunyan,  John,  53. 
burn,  212. 

Cablegram,  214. 

calculate,  83. 

calibre,  84. 

cant,  72. 

captain,  136. 

caption,  85. 

captivate,  85. 

case,  294. 

casemated,  99. 

casuality,  210. 

casualty,  210. 

catch,  86. 

catched,  108. 

Caxton,  William,  6. 

cerse,  211. 

character,  86. 

chastity,  87. 

Chaucer,  374. 

Chaucer's  "  well  of  English  un- 

defiled,"  9. 
chemise,  159. 
child,  161. 
Christmastide,  216. 
Christtide,  216. 
Cicely,  211. 
Cicero,  17. 
Cis,  211. 
Cissy,  211. 
citizen,  87. 
clarionet,  87. 
clayen,  291. 
coldine,  204. 


comfortable,  204. 

commence,  168. 

common,  155. 

companionable,  207. 

complainable,  207. 

complete,  154. 

composite  character  of  English, 
367. 

compounds  with  prefixes  and  suf- 
fixes, 353. 

compound  words,  360. 

confectionery,  117. 

confined,  161. 

conjunction,  304. 

connection,  118. 

conscience,  11. 

consider,  88. 

Constitution  of  the  United  States. 
25. 

consummate,  89. 

contend,  125. 

continence,  87. 

continental  damn,  212,  399. 

Continentals,  400. 

controversialist,  197. 

convene,  90. 

conversationalist,  197. 

convinced,  129. 

convoke,  90. 

cook-stove,  213. 

copper-smith,  361. 

copula,  331. 

Cotton's  Montaigne,  321. 

counter-act,  361. 

counterfeit,  361. 

couple,  89. 

covetousness,  91. 

cranberry,  352. 

crime,  90. 

criticism,  15. 

Cromwell,  Oliver,  3. 

Crusoe,  Robinson,  346. 

currant,  352. 

Decimated,  91. 
defalcation,  92. 
default,  92. 
definitions,  343. 
Defoe,  Daniel,  346. 
despair,  198. 
diagrams,  214,  363. 
Dickens,  Charles,  316. 
dictionaries,  authority  of,  342. 


I 


INDEX 


433 


dictionaries,  English,  346. 
Dictionary,  Bailey's,  340. 
Dictionary,  Johnson's,  347. 
dictionary,  plan  of,  357. 
did,  100. 
different  to,  392. 
digged,  108. 
dining,  352. 
dining-room,  352. 
directly,  109. 
dirt,  92. 
dLs,  354,  355. 
disable,  300. 
disagi-ee,  354. 
disagreeable,  354. 
disappear,  354. 
disapprove,  354. 
disarm,  354. 
disbarrassed,  382. 
disease,  300. 
disinter,  300. 
disposable,  207. 
disprivacied,  381. 
disremember,  134. 
dister,  300. 
distrust,  355. 
divine,  93. 
do,  104. 
dock,  93. 
donate,  188,  210. 
donation,  210. 
done,  104. 
done  gone,  325. 
Don  Quixote,  324. 
double  negative,  388. 
double  superlative,  388. 
downward,  193. 
drank,  104. 
dress,  94. 
drive,  175. 
drunk,  104. 

Ecphractick,  356. 

editorial,  95. 

efFectuate,  126. 

eggs,  7. 

ego,  223. 

either,  241. 

either  and  neither,  241,  378. 

ek,  223. 

electropathy,  194. 

en,  221. 

enceinte,  160. 


enclose,  189. 
endorse,  189. 
endure,  100. 
English,  composite  character  of, 

307.  _ 
English  dictionaries,  339. 
English,  pure,  8. 
English  sentence,  260. 
enhunger,  382. 
enquire,  189. 
enthused,  190. 
epigram,  214. 
epigraph,  214. 
esquire,  95. 

etymology,  xvii.,  259,  342,  364. 
evacuate,  95. 
eventuate,  126. 
ever,  353. 
ever-acting,  353. 
evergreens,  108. 
ever-living,  353. 
ever-running,  353. 
every,  96. 
ewer,  70. 
example,  98. 
excellent,  98. 
except,  98,  198. 
exception  proves  the  rule,  497. 
executed,  97. 
exemplary,  98. 
exist,  284,  329. 
expect,  98. 
experience,  89. 
experienced,  99. 
experiment,  99. 
experimentalize,  197. 
exponential,  199. 
extend,  101. 
extraordinary,  259. 
eyren,  7. 

FaU,  343. 
fashionable,  204. 
father,  50. 
fellowship,  192,  202. 
female,  102. 
female  relation,  118. 
fetch,  82. 
fiddle-bow,  360. 
fiddle-stick,  300. 
fiddle-string,  300. 
figures,  303. 
first  rate,  238. 


434 


INDEX 


flee,  101. 
Florio,  328. 
flown,  109. 
fly,  101. 
forcible,  204. 
Forster,  John,  37. 
forward,  193. 
Froude,  J.  A.,  37. 

Gambling,  91. 

gat,  106. 

gender,  297. 

general,  136, 

gent,  193. 

gentleman,  163. 

gentry,  117. 

get,  102. 

Gibbon,  Edward,  378. 

Gil  Bias,  298. 

glass,  50. 

go-cart,  213. 

gold,  347. 

golden,  239,  241. 

gold-smith,  361. 

good,  95,  223. 

goods,  128. 

gotten,  103. 

government,  275. 

governments,  186. 

Gower,  John,  107. 

gown,  94. 

gram,  214. 

Grammar,  English  and  Latin,  254. 

Grammarless  Tongue,  274. 

graph,  214. 

gratuitous,  109. 

grow,  110. 

grown,  109. 

gubernatorial,  193. 

gums,  XV. 

Had  rather,  391. 

Hall,  Bishop,  3,  6. 

have,  24, 103. 

Hawthorne,  Nathaniel,  35. 

head,  350. 

heart,  350. 

help,  110. 

help-meet,  111. 

her,  227. 

hers,  227. 

herself,  232. 

himself,  228,  229,  249. 


his-self,  230. 
Hob,  211. 
honorable,  136. 
horse,  351. 
Howell,  James,  380. 
HoweUs,  W.  D.,  373. 
humane,  112. 
humanitarian,  112. 
hydropathy,  194. 

I,  223,  224. 

I  am  going  to  town  to-morrow, 

283. 
ice-cream,  112. 
ice-water,  112. 
ieh,  223. 
idleness,  91. 

I  go  to  town  to-morrow,  283. 
ik,  223. 
ill,  95,  179. 
illy,  373. 

impassionable,  23. 
in'ards,  361. 

inaugurate,  24,  113,  366. 
Indian-opathist,  194. 
indorse,  114. 
infinitive  mood,  285. 
inflection,  259. 
influence  of  language,  xiv. 
initiate,  113. 
inmates,  114. 
inquirable,  207. 
inst.,  152. 
integrity,  23. 
inter,  360. 
intercess,  185,  210. 
intercessed,  185. 
intercession,  185,  210. 
iutrinsecate,  203. 
introduce,  131. 
inwit,  againbite  of,  11. 
iron-hearted,  346. 
irregular  orthography,  360, 
is  being,  394. 
is  being  done,  311. 
ist,  197. 
it  is  me,  231. 
its,  222,  225,  386. 
itself,  232. 
ize,  196. 

Jar,  71. 
jeopardize,  197. 


INDEX 


435 


Jew,  115. 

Jewel,  Bishop,  316. 

jewelry,  116. 

Joan,  211. 

Johnson,  Dr.,  317. 

Johnson's  Dictionary,  346. 

joint-stock-company,  360. 

joint-stock-company-limited,  360. 

jug,  71. 

Junius  Letters,  379. 

Jus  et  norma  loquendi,  366. 

juvenile,  'J3. 

juxtapose,  239. 

King,  4, 
kinsman,  118. 
kinswoman,  118> 

Lady,  162. 
landed,  99. 

language,  influence  of,  xiv. 
last,  50. 

Latimer,  Bishop,  375. 
Latin  elements  of  Modern  Eng- 
lish, 10. 
Latin  sentence,  261. 
laughable,  204. 
lay,  101,  119,  141. 
leaden,  239. 
leader,  95. 
leading  article,  95. 
leathern,  239. 
leave,  95,  118. 
leg,  163. 
legalize,  196. 
leisurable,  204. 
lengthy,  392. 
lethal,  21. 

lexicon  of  a  foreign  tongue,  358. 
liable,  79. 
library,  117; 
lie,  101,  119,  141. 
like,  121, 123. 
likely,  79,  84. 
limb,  163. 
liveable,  209. 
live  through,  100. 
loan,  122. 
locals,  186. 
locate,  122. 
longsome,  393. 
look,  adverbs  with,  393. 
love,  104,  123. 


Lowell,  James  Russell,  36,  373, 

381. 
lui,  231. 
lui-meme,  231. 

Macaulay,  T.  B.,  316. 

Mahn,  Dr.,  343. 

manufacturer,  123. 

marriageable,  204. 

marry,  124. 

Marsh,  G.  P.,  34,  244. 

Maxima  debetur  puero  reverentia, 

264. 
mealtide,  216. 
meet.  111. 
mention,  77. 
mew,  108. 
militate,  125. 
milk,  350. 
Milton,  316. 
mis,  353. 
misnomered,  384. 
misrecoUect,  134. 
mistook,  105. 
Misused  Words,  68. 
Mohammedanism,  362. 
moi,  231. 
moi-meme,  231. 
Moll,  211. 
moneyed,  99. 
monogram,  214. 
monograph,  214. 
monthly,  93. 
Mormonism,  362. 
Morte  d' Arthur,  192. 
mow,  107. 
murder,  91. 
my-self,  228. 

Nadir,  356. 
nasty,  l&O. 
ne,  7. 

necessitate,  126. 
neighborhood,  155. 
neither,  241. 
neologism,  371,  387. 
newspaper,  xiv. 
Newspaper  English,  18. 
normal,  24. 

Cak,  347. 
oaten,  239.       * 
obituary,  93t 


436 


INDEX 


objectionable,  204- 

obnoxious,  126. 

observe,  126. 

obsoleteness,  359. 

only  (misplaced),  389. 

o'errun,  105. 

oppose,  125. 

orthography,  258,  364. 

orthography,  irregular,  359. 

our,  226. 

ours,  226. 

ourselves,  228. 

outer,  153. 

out-take,  198. 

ovations,  74. 

overshoes,  2V. 

over  the  signature,  172. 

Painter,  80. 

pants,  193. 

paragraph,  214. 

Parsons's    lines    "  On  a  bust   of 

Dante,"  268. 
part,  129. 
partially,  127. 
partly,  127. 
partook,  127. 
party,  128. 
pastor,  50. 
patron,  128. 
pea,  227. 
pell-mell,  129. 
perfect,  154. 

perfect  infinitive,  misuse  of,  391. 
persuaded,  129. 
Peters,  Dr.  John  C,  383. 
petroleum,  197. 
philosophic,  a,  93. 
photogram,  214. 
pier,  93. 
piety,  134. 
pise,  227. 
pison,  227. 
pitcher,  70. 
place,  122. 
poetess,  187. 
point  of  view,  213. 
polysyndeton,  356. 
Pope,  Alexander,  105,  371,  376. 
porringer,  71. 
portion,  129. 
possessioner,  375.    * 
posted,  114. 


pot,  70. 

practitioner,  198,  375. 

predicate,  xvi.,  130. 

prefixes  and  suffixes,  compounds 

■with,  349. 
present,  131. 
presidential,  198. 
preventative,  210. 
preventive,  210. 
probationer,  375. 
proceed,  ll4. 
progress,  23. 
pronouns,  220. 
pronouns,  antiquity  of,  222. 
pronouns,  formation  of,  220. 
pronunciation,  364. 
proper  names,  361. 
prosody,  258. 
prove,  100,  104. 
proven,  104,  201,  373. 
provincial  words,  361. 
prox.,  152. 

pueri  amabant  puellam,  261. 
pure  English,  8. 

Quadriphyllous,  356. 
quite,  131. 
Quixote,  Don,  324. 

Railroad  Depot,  132. 
rathe,  393. 
ratiocinate,  126. 
Reade,  Charles,  382. 
real  estate,  133. 
receptions,  74. 
recollect,  134. 
recover,  114. 
recuperate,  114. 
redemptioner,  375. 
regard,  89. 
relation,  118. 
reliable,  202. 
religion,  134. 
remit,  135. 

remorse  of  conscience,  11. 
repudiate,  114. 
reputation,  86. 
residence,  114. 
restive,  135. 
resurrected,  210. 
resurrection,  210. 
resurrectionized,  384. 
retire,  164. 


INDEX 


437 


reverend,  135. 
rid,  388. 
ride,  175,  388. 
right,  177. 
right  away,  393. 
riparian,  1U8. 
Rob,  211. 
Robin,  211. 
rode,  100. 
rooster,  164. 
rose,  105. 
rubbers,  xv. 
run,  344,  345,  377. 

Sample-room,  xvi.,  138,  360. 

sanctuary,  114. 

Savage,  Richard,  105. 

say,  77,  127. 

Scaliger,  16. 

school-books,  371. 

sea,  351. 

seasonable,  204. 

section,  138. 

see,  158. 

self,  229,  352. 

send,  135. 

sentence,  259,  331. 

set,  101,  119. 

settle,  122,  175. 

sew,  108. 

Shakespeare,  347. 

shall  and  will,  244. 

shamefaced,  211. 

shamefast,  211. 

she,  224. 

shew,  108. 

shined,  108,  377. 

shirt,  159. 

shoe-horn,  213. 

short-cake,  352. 

should.  246. 

show,  108. 

shrubbery,  117. 

sick,  179. 

Sidney's  Astrophel  and  Stella,  269. 

signature,  over  the,  172. 

silvern,  241. 

silver-smith,  261. 

sin,  90. 

Sis,  211. 

Sissy,  211. 

sit,  119,  1.39. 

sitten,  106. 


six-hole  premium,  18G. 

skedaddle,  223. 

slang,  xiv.,  31,  72. 

slavery,  117. 

smock,  159. 

smuggling,  91. 

snew,  107. 

snown,  107. 

sociable,  144. 

social,  144. 

some,  232. 

some  (as  suffix),  392. 

sot,  140. 

sow,  108. 

special,  145. 

splendid,  145. 

stand-point,  212,  416. 

state,  146. 

station,  132. 

stay,  180. 

steadfast,  211. 

stereogram,  214. 

Sterne,  Laurence,  104. 

stole,  105. 

stonen,  241. 

stop,  180. 

storm,  146. 

strake,  108. 

straw,  350. 

strawberry,  352. 

streeted,  380. 

striae,  356. 

strike,  108. 

strove,  108. 

style,  36,  52. 

suffer,  92. 

suffixes,  compounds  with  prefixes 

and,  349. 
suggest,  259. 
supervise,  114. 
supper-room,  352. 
supper-time,  352. 
suppose,  89. 
Swedenborgian,  362. 
Swift,  Dean,  105. 

Talented,  99. 
tangential,  199. 
tankard,  70. 
tavern,  138. 
tea,  146. 
teached,  108. 
tea-room,  352. 


438 


INDEX 


tea-time,  352. 

technical  words,  356. 

teelinical   words   in   general   use, 

356. 
telegram,  213. 
telegraph,  213,  223. 
Tennyson,  Alfred,  378. 
tenses,  283.  \ 

thalagram,  214. 
the  boys  loved  the  girl,  261. 
themselves,  228,  232. 
think,  89. 
those-sort,  151. 
threaden,  239. 
thrived,  105. 
tider  you  go,  the  tider  you  come, 

216. 
tid,  gnmd's  no  in,  217. 
time  and  tide,  215. 
tinker's  damn,  400. 
toi,  231. 
toi-meme,  231. 
Tooke,  Home,  333,  349. 
Tooke,  Home,  on  vrilgar  words, 

361. 
tooth-drawer,  352. 
tooth-fiUer,  352. 
toward,  193. 
to  wit,  287. 
transmit,  114. 
transpire,  xvi.,  146. 
treasonable,  204. 
Trench,  Archbishop,  339,  359. 
trial,  197. 

Troilus  and  Creseide,  267. 
TroUope,  Anthony,  56. 
Tr-'lope,  Mrs.,  56. 
trooper's  damn,  400. 
true-seeming,  198. 
truism,  152. 
trust,  354. 
trustworthy,  205. 
truth,  152. 
truth-like,  198. 
try,  101,  197. 
turgid  morabty,  23. 

Ult.,  152. 
un,  353. 
uncouth,  361. 
undergo,  101. 
bnderstonden,  7> 


undisprivacied,  38L 
unrepentable,  209. 
unsoft,  354. 
un-sound,  .361. 
unsuit,  354. 
unwitty,  354. 
upward,  193. 
usage,  xiv.,  369. 
us-selven,  229. 
utter,  153. 

Variance,  125. 

Venerable  Bede,  137. 

ventilate,  154. 

veracity,  154. 

verb,  331. 

verbs,  auxiliary,  288. 

vice,  90. 

vicinity,  155. 

violincello,  violoncello,  87* 

voices,  291. 

vraisemblable,  198. 

vulgar,  155. 

vulgar  words,  361. 

Wanhope,  198. 

wash-tub,  213. 

waxen,  239. 

way,  132. 

weaponed,  380. 

Webster,  Daniel,  35. 

well  of  English  undefiled,  9. 

were,  24. 

wharf,  93. 

whatever  is,  is  right,  5. 

wheaten,  239. 

whether  or  no,  390. 

white-smith,  361. 

Whitsuntide,  216. 

Wicliffe,  375. 

widow-woman,  156. 

will,  244. 

witness,  158. 

woman,  162. 

women's  style,  55. 

wooden,  .346. 

word  can  have  but  one  real  mean- 
ing, 303. 

word,  definition  of,  182. 

words,  compound,  360. 

words  formed  upon  proper  names, 
362. 


J 


INDEX 


439 


nrords  merely  arbitrary  sounds,  3. 

words,  provincial,  o62. 

words  that  are  not  words,  182. 

would,  246. 

writ,  387. 

wrote,  387. 

Wyatt,  Sir  Thomas,  380. 

Yarnen,  241. 

Yo  el  Key,  231. 

Young's  "  Night  Thoughts,"  335. 


Zenith,  356. 
zeolitiform,  356. 
zinkiferous,  350. 
zinky,  350. 
zocle,  350. 

zoophytological,  356. 
zumosinieter,  356. 
zygodactylous,  356. 
zygomatic,  356. 

&C.,  &c.,  191. 


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